Blood Of the Wardens
by Mojo1586
Summary: A fanfiction following three Grey Wardens and their journey to slay the archdemon stop the blight, namely M.Cousland and his quest for vengeance, M. Amell in a world that fears him, and F..Mahariel and the traumas she carries, as the relationships that occur and the dangers they face. Pairings: M.Cousland/F. Mahariel, M.Amell/Morrigan
1. Chapter 1

CH 1: NOBILITY & BETRAYAL

**-Gareth Cousland-**

The flames flickered and danced before me

"What's the matter Pup, you seem troubled?"

The sound of father's voice shocked me out of my reverie. Looking up I suddenly found myself standing in the main hall, staring into the roaring fireplace that dominated the western expanse of the room. I shook my head roughly and turned around to be greeted with Bryce Cousland, Teyrn of Highever's stern face staring back at me.

"Pup, are you ok?" father asked again, his frown deepening.

For some reason I had trouble forming the words I wanted, but managed to get out a response "Yes father, I just lost myself for a minute thinking about…" I paused because I found I was unsure of what exactly I had been doing in the hall in the first place or how I'd even gotten there.

"Come my boy your hardly a child ant longer, but a man your age shouldn't be drifting off staring into a fire." His expression slowly lightened as he put his hand to my shoulder, "Leave such things to old men like me and continue on with the life the Maker gave you and don't let what happened consume the man you are"

"Father what are you talking…" my neck suddenly seethed with pain, reaching up to feel where the pain was strongest I felt a wet sort of warmth, I put my hand up to my face to see that it was coated with blood. "What" grabbing my neck to stem the flow "What is this!"

I looked at my father and saw that his smile had vanished and was replaced with a grimace of pain, looking down; I saw that his fine clothes were in tatters and his torso covered in red, searching for the source, I discovered he was sporting a horrendous sword wound to his side. The wound ran straight through his body and was, even a child could tell, fatal. Suddenly he coughed expelling yet more blood. I lurched away, staggering back until I was against the wall and suddenly noticed for the first time that I held a bared sword coated in blood and viscera in a gauntleted hand. On closer look I found that the rest of my body was similarly armored in an assortment of scaled armor.

"Pup, Gareth you mustn't let this take you" Bryce said staggering forward into my arms, and suddenly the events of that night played out in my head all at once.

I remembered waking up in the darkness of my room to find my mabari hound Drey's barking at my door. I was about to go quiet him so he wouldn't end up waking the entire castle when suddenly light poured into the room as a guard burst in shouting that the castle was under attack before an arrow pierced his throat spattering me in his lifeblood. Before his body had even hit the floor two men had entered the room just as I cleared my bed, one skinny with a thin face, sporting two curved daggers after throwing down his bow and wearing bloody leather armor while the other much shorter man wielded a nasty looking mace and buckler who was wearing a cowl hiding his face. I had barely enough time to register the family crest of Arl Rendon Howe adorning the shield when the mace wielding soldier in the cowl charged me weapon raised.

While I was still in shock from seeing the guard, who I recognized as a man who had served my family since I had been a child brutally murdered by men bearing the crest of one of my families most long standing allies, years of harsh instruction by Castle Cousland's master-at-arms had conditioned me to move on reflex and I just barely managed duck past the first soldiers' attempt to cave in my skull and lurched directly into the path of the second man who stood blocking the door with knives readied and a sick smile on his face. Before he could move to attack or say a word however, a sudden terrifying howl pierced the room as Drey lunged past me straight at the man, bringing him down screaming and knocking his blades loose from his grasp.

I had thought about commanding Drey to stop, to show mercy, but then looked at the stunned face of the dead guard thought better of it.

"Drey, KILL!" I remembered shouting as I saw the dog I had cared for as a puppy and who had been dismissed by my older brother Fergus as a softie rip out the screaming man's throat, I suppose father was right for telling me he was a War dog not just a house pet. The second soldier had already turned around but had more focus on the dog then me; I scooped up one of the fallen man's daggers and neatly spun around to face him bringing the dead man's blade up before he charged forward screaming, brandishing his weapon.

Despite being armed with an unfamiliar weapon and having no armor beyond cloth leggings, training and superior size and reach won out over the soldiers wild, undisciplined swings and the borrowed dagger soon buried itself in the man's heart killing him almost instantly. I stood back to view my handiwork, and shuddered. I'd trained for years as a warrior by some of the best teachers and prided myself on my skills with a sword, the only thing I'd ever beaten Fergus consistently growing up, and had even won a few tournament melee's as a mystery knight facing men considerable more experienced warriors and bested them all. Despite having encountered bandits and highwayman over the years patrolling our families' lands as head of the militia, I had never taken pleasure in killing or the raw brutality of the fight, curious, I moved to remove the man's cowl and recoiled at the sight of the man, no the boy's face staring back at me eye blank and sightless. He couldn't have been more than seventeen summers old.

That would explain the wild untrained style of his attacks and his small size. Standing and shaking my head at the sheer waste I almost jumped when I suddenly felt a soft warm pressure against my leg. Looking down I saw Drey sitting at my feet staring up at me blood dripping from his maw. I had almost forgotten the man he had savaged in order to protect me, the body was lying spread-eagled in the door frame unrecognizable from the neck up. When Drey began to whimper, I knelt down to scratch his head behind the ears in his favorite spot.

"Sorry boy I'd forgotten this was a first for you"

I couldn't deny the pain I felt for the dead boy, but as I turned my head back to the bodies, I realized that these men had just tried to kill me; and boy or not, he was an enemy and I had acted accordingly.

I could hear my trainer's voice in the back of my mind as I got to my feet, "When you bare a weapon with the intention to harm, be prepared to invite the same upon yourself in kind" the grizzled veteran had been a taskmaster at times, but the man made sure each of his students knew the responsibility that came with using a sword, and the boy had made his choice when he attacked me.

I made towards the large chest I kept to the left of door; I opened it to pull out a vest of studded leather along with a matching set of gloves and boots, practice armor, simple but effective. I might have an uncommon level of skill with a sword but I wasn't stupid enough to think I could make a difference in nothing but a pair of bloody trousers. Underneath the armor lay a large wooden kite shield as well as a simple broadsword, donning my make do armor, I also picked up a small silver necklace in the shape of a leaf, it had been gift that was very precious to me and I just didn't feel right not taking it along, I walked out into the hall with Drey by my side.

I was greeted by the sight of another pair of laughing soldiers carrying swords walking into the room from the direction of the castle proper, likely to check on the status of the two poor sods in my room.

"I know, but I still think they could have held off killing that elven bitch at least until we'd gotten to have some fun too, Micah, Derek have you kill that noble shit yet …huh?" the men finally noticed they were sharing the room with a growling dog and a large, well-armed and very pissed off looking noble.

"Sorry, but your friends are unavailable at the moment, however I would be glad to entertain you" I taunted raising my sword and shield in a ready stance, "Well, COME ON THEN!"

The two men lunged forward swords raised, as I blocked the first man's blow with my shield and shifted to parry the others blow off my sword I grimaced, these men were barely any more skilled then the boy and his iron club but unlike him they worked as a pair, as the fight wore on they continued to shift their directions of attack attempting to draw me into extending myself more than I could handle while also working to keep Drey at a distance.

However soon enough one of the men, the one who called me a noble shit, lunged forward after a particularly vicious attack from his comrade broke off a piece of my shield forcing me back, as he moved to bring down his blade down on my head I swiftly caught the blade and tore it from his grasp.

He looked up at my face and I could see the fear in his eyes up until my sword ran its course across his chest. Turning on his friend, I sprinted forward sword raised, the man attempted to leap backwards to avoid the blade, unfortunately for him, standing at over six feet affords a man a good amount of reach and my sword broke through his unsteady block and straight through his armor, biting deep his collarbone. I then pushed off the corpse with my foot, tearing my sword out of the dead man's chest, I bent down to wipe the blade clean on the fallen man's armor before sheathing the sword at my side.

"Darling!" a shrill shout suddenly permeated the room.

Turning around, I saw my mother Teyrna Eleanor Cousland sprint into the now bloodied body strewn hall. Grabbing me in a tight embrace she suddenly pulled back to look me over, I then noticed with some surprise that she was wearing a set of worn looking leather armor with a longbow and a quiver strung over her back.

"A yell woke me up, I heard men shouting and barred the door, are you injured?"

"I'm fine mother" I was covered in blood but it wasn't my own, the worst I'd come off with was a few nicks in my armor that hadn't reach flesh, "These bastards got worst of it, but there's a dead guardsman, Giles I think."

"Poor man" She looked down at the men with a look of anger and noticed who they were, "Wait that's Howe's crest on the armor, these are Howe's men! Why would they be attacking you?"

"I don't know, but these are probably his men who were running behind getting here, I heard Howe discussing it with father when I saw them together earlier today in the Main hall, when he told me I would be taking over care of the castle, before I went to collect Drey in the kitchens, remember?" Examining the dead men I realized I recognized one of them, he had been with Howe in the main hall as well. He had seemed very interested in I identifying who I was, I had been going to see Fergus and hadn't thought anything of it.

Mother grabbed my arm with a look of dawning horror on her face, "If these men were delayed on purpose…that lying bastard I'll cut his throat myself, have you seen your father, he never came to bed?!"

"No I stayed up reading a book then went to bed, could he have stayed up with Howe?"

"Maybe, we have to rally what's left of the guard and find him!"

"Alright, we should also check on Oren and Oriana" I turned my head to look at their door right across the hall from mine.

"By the maker, those men, what if they entered your Brother's room first before they went to yours?"

My blood ran cold at the thought as I rushed across the towards the door and threw it open already dreading the fact that it was unlocked,

"No, No, Maker, No"

It was all I could think of as I saw the bodies of both my eight year old cousin Oren and his mother Oriana, the love of my brother's life and my sister in law, lying on the cold ground. Oriana's throat had been opened ear to ear, thankfully it looked quick with no signs of rape, a small mercy. She and I had always gotten on well from the moment Fergus had met her at one of mothers spring salons, I had even lost a match to Fergus during a tourney so he could impress her father and bring back an old Fereldan custom of presenting a wreath of flowers to the fair maiden along with a proposal. Oren however, had been stabbed through the chest and left for dead, it looked as if he had tried to crawl to his mother before he succumbed.

Before I could stop her, Mother ran into the room and fell to her knees cradling the boy in her arms tears running down her face. "NO, my poor Oren" she cried hugging his body closer as she sobbed. "What manner of fiend slaughters innocents!?" Drey just sat their whimpering trying to nudge the boy awake. "Howe's not even taking hostages; he means to kill all of us, oh Fergus, I'm so sorry"

I should have comforted her, done something other than just stand there, but all I could think of was how just hours ago the boy had been alive and happy, seeing his father off to battle. I'd even planned out how I was going to convince his mother to let me teach him a little sword play like the boy had wanted me too and had been trying to convince me for weeks. The boy was so young and to see him like this, cold, and lifeless, taken in such a cruel and painful way, I felt something begin bend inside me.

"I'll make them pay, all of them, every last one." I slowly walked out of the room with Drey on my heels and through the doors to the apartments standing around outside of Lady Landra's quarters, four men sat garbed in armor similar to the men I'd left dead already standing around laughing and passing a wineskin around. In the span of two minutes 3 were dead and the last was crawling away from me with two hamstrung legs and a stab wound in his stomach.

I slowly walked over, kicked him onto his back and stood on his throat until he died pleading for his life grabbing at my leg as I slowly built pressure, any thoughts of mercy had died along with the small boy and his mother. I looked inside to find the bodies of Dairen, Landra, and Iona. Dairen looked as if he had died trying to protect his mother, Iona though hadn't been so lucky. I remembered talking to the elven women in my Grandfather's library. It had been an interesting conversation over how she had come into Lady Landra's service, she'd even told me a little about her daughter, Amethyne, who lived back in the Denerim Alienage. I'd gotten the impression she had something of a crush on me but would have felt guilty exploiting that, looking at her now however I wished I had given her a chance, she might still be alive if I had.

After giving my mother time to mourn the loss of her close friend, we continued out into the atrium proper. The smell of smoke was everywhere along with the sound of screams and shouts.

"Gareth can you hear the fighting, Howe's men must be everywhere"

Looking back at her I could see she was still shaky from Oren's death and her eyes were still red and puffy, she was in no condition to be fighting.

"Mother stay behind me and Drey I don't want you in any more danger than can be helped." I stated pleadingly placing my hand on her shoulder.

"I am no Orleasian wallflower, I was a battle-maiden before meeting your father, I can handle myself" she suddenly knocked my hand away and smiled weakly "I've already lost a grandson, your dead wrong if you think I'm going to sit back and watch my youngest son place himself in danger while I do nothing."

Seeing that this was not a battle I could win I could only sigh, "Well what will we do now?"

"The front gates that's where your father would be, if Howe's men have already penetrated this far we should focus on finding him and then reaching the servants entrance in the kitchen's larder to escape."

"No!" I shouted, rounding on her, "I will not run and hide while that shit pile of a traitor destroys my home and everyone in it. Find father and get out but don't ask me to leave while everyone else suffers"

That's when my mother slapped me hard across the face, stunning me. I was by no means a model child like Fergus and had raised my own fair share of hell in my time for my Nan who had scolded me harshly, but this was the first time my mother had ever struck me and it was a shock.

"Don't be foolish, going after Howe now will only get you killed and will accomplish nothing, even if we can't find your father, you must live"

I heard the sense in her words but my anger would not cease, "I WANT HOWE DEAD!" I all but shouted at her.

My mother looked at me with the same face I had always seen her use on father, and it made me wilt, she then moved closer and put her hand on my cheek, "Then survive and visit vengeance upon him but at the right moment, for now you must focus on living." All in all I had little choice but to accept her plan and carry on.

As we made our way through the castle we quickly found the way to the kitchens blocked by debris and were forced to take the long way through the castle, along the way we came across holdouts of guards facing off against Howe's soldiers, after assisting them, our numbers slowly swelled to include a group of ten armed guards as well as a handful of servants.

As we continued towards the main hall my mother suddenly called for the group to stop, motioning me over quickly, she pulled a brass key from a pocket in her belt and pressed it into my hand.

"We're getting close to the family treasury, the Cousland family blade lies inside, here darling take my key, Howe must not get his hands on that sword that sword."

Using the key I managed to open the heavy lock and enter our families vault. Despite having lived in the castle my whole life I had only ever been in the room twice before, once with my father who was showing me some artifacts of our families history, and again with a friend and his sister to get a more up close inspection of some of the more interesting pieces, basic translation, putting on an old helmet and playing tag between stacks of items.

Once inside I was surprised to find it bare except for an armor stand bearing a set of full scale armor belonging to my father, a shield mount, and a long, thin chest, reaching inside I pulled out a work of art made weapon, created from a unique mix of steel and grey iron the blade was a longer and heavier than the sword I had now, the broadsword had a worked cross guard and an enlarged pommel displaying the crossed laurels of House Cousland was also lightly enchanted to ward off impurities such as rust and blood and would always keep its edge. The last time I had seen it was during my friend Ser Gilmores knighting ceremony. Along with the sword I also donned my father's armor and kite shield, a heavy slab of metal which apparently had a storied history as well in our family and still bore scars of blades upon its face. It would serve me much better than the wood wreck I had been carrying.

Exiting the treasury our group continued into the main hall where we encountered Ser Gilmore with a contingent of men facing off against a large group of attackers including a mage who was throwing fire in our direction killing the servants as well as two guardsmen who weren't fast enough to jump out of the way, my mother ended her threat with a well-placed arrow to the eye socket while the rest of us moved to support the knights.

After speaking to Ser Gilmore, we discovered that my father had been injured severely and Duncan, a Grey Warden recruiter had taken him to the kitchens, the man then declared he would hold the gates and told my mother and me to flee. As we turned down the alley to the kitchen we were met with the sight of two well-armed soldiers as well as a fully armored knight wielding a great sword as my mother and Drey engaged the soldiers I ran for the knight.

In a few short blows I could tell I was in trouble, we were of a similar height and I had the advantage of a shield however I had also been fighting for most of the last hour and had sustained quite a few injuries, none serious but enough to hamper my fighting ability. A sudden screaming pain in my leg where an arrow had pierced my armor earlier caused me to stumble, taking his chance the knight rushed forward stabbing at me with the large sword. From my poor position I couldn't effectively parry the blade and the force knocked my sword from my grip, I managed to avoid death but the sword cut deeply into the right side of my neck as it passed, the knights momentum continued on as he then lashed out with his knee delivering a heavy hit to my chest. I felt ribs break with the force of the blow despite my armor and fell on my hands and knees, the knight suddenly grabbed my shoulder length hair and hoisted me up. Through the haze of pain as I held a hand up to stave of the blood pouring down my neck and saw my mother, her assailant dead, nursing a wound to leg.

"Time to die you noble shitheel" the knight said, his voice muffled by the great helm he wore raising the sword to my throat.

Suddenly the pressure on my head vanished as Drey leapt onto the man and pushed him away from me. Looking behind me from my position on the ground I saw Drey bite and snarl at the man when the man's blade suddenly found flesh opening a terrible wound on the dog's side. When I saw Drey go down whimpering and crying, I felt the dam that had been bending ever since finding Oren's body break.

Suddenly the world was in a vivid shade of red as anger, no pure rage permeated my mind and body at the thought of all I had lost this night, a terrible war cry suddenly split the night as I charged at the lone knight with nothing but a shield. Taken aback by my sudden charge, he vainly tried to raise his blade in time but it was knocked aside as I tackled him full force onto the ground, straddling his chest with my legs pinning his arms he could only give a short cry as I brought the pointed bottom of the shield onto his helmeted face again and again screaming the entire time, I don't know how long it took until I calmed down but at the end I came to my senses with Drey hobbling towards me and my mother staring down at me, her face pale. The knight was most certainly dead, his helmet bent flattened with the force of my blows with bits of blood and grey matter leaking through cracks.

The memories flooded back as I stared in horror at my father who had now fallen to his knees. We had found him badly wounded from his encounter with Howe, and had only survived thanks to Duncan. I was still in a kind of daze for most of the conversation after my experience with the knight but at the end, Duncan made his offer, he would assist in our escape as long as I would join him as a recruit in his order, the subject had been broached before earlier that day in the main hall but I had adamantly refused.

I was about to refuse again when my Father explained that I had a duty to the people of this land, and that every warden was needed to face the darkspawn horde rising to the south, our family always does its duty first. I accepted the warden's offer for my father's sake, but only on the condition that Howe would receive justice.

As we heard the gates fall, my mother told me that she would be staying with father to buy us time, I was forced to abandon both my father and mother after only a few short words, it wasn't enough.

"I'm sorry" I said to my father's shade, looking around I saw now that we were not alone in the hall, the shades of my mother, Oren, Oriana, Aldous the sage, my Nan, Ser Gilmore, everyone in the castle I had seen die and more surrounded me.

"Pup, you have nothing to be sorry for, Howe did this, do your duty to the blight and neglect this course" suddenly the room was filled with fire and rats poured into the room bringing down the shades one by one laughing with Howe's sneering voice.

I jolted awake suddenly in a cold sweat, the cool night air lightly buffeting my chest and rattling the necklace I wore and Drey lying next to me. We were camped in a forest a short ways from Lake Calenhad, the Circle of Magi standing in sharp relief to the moonlight, snores came from the other end of the camp and I looked to find Duncan and the mage we had just picked up as a recruit. I picked up the sheathed sword lying next to me and walked to the lakes edge, looking down I saw my reflection clearly for the first time in the week since the my life had changed forever. A hard face with sunken eyes stared back at me, I had had Duncan give me a sharp razor and scissors the day after the attack and I had shorn off most of my hair leaving it short and cropped, better to put under a helmet and impossible to gain purchase with a hand, the same attention had not been given to my face, now covered in dark stubble.

I raised my hand to my most vivid difference since that night, a long scar now ran along the right side of my neck just under my jaw line. It had continued bleeding for days until the mage, William Amell, had tried healing, the magic worked and the wound closed, however the scar remained. Drawing my sword I stood staring at the blade,

"I will remember my duty father, I will do all in my power to end this blight, however, I would not rest until Howe's blood coated my blade, I am Gareth Cousland and I will have justice for my family, I will have vengeance."

-END

A/N: Thanks for reading everyone, this is my first attempt at writing a fiction. Please leave comments and reviews negative or positive, every bit of advice helps.


	2. Chapter 2

JOURNEY SIDETRACKED

**-William Amell-**

**Somewhere Within the Fade:**

In the fade, time and space hold very little meaning; instead motion and environment are completely influenced by thought and willpower. The area where I now found myself resembled a large broken plateau floating over a large expanse of darkened cityscape. Apparently this area was known as the Black City, the seat of the Maker which once glowed gold, and was corrupted by Tevinter Magisters prior to the first era. For their sin, the magisters were thrown from the fade and cursed, becoming twisted creatures, the first darkspawn who are even now attempting to taint the world in their image through the blight.

I didn't know about the whole seat of the maker thing but I knew from experience that it was the one place that I could not shift to within the fade, despite the new awareness of the fade I had gained since my harrowing; I was still relatively unfamiliar with the nuances of the world of dreams. I still shuddered internally when I thought about the experience forced on me by the Templars and First Enchanter. I was still haunted by the voice Mouse the demon who had tried to fool me in the fade by acting as an poor trapped apprentice taunting me.

"Simple killing is a warrior's job. The real dangers of the Fade are preconceptions... careless trust... _pride_. Keep your wits about you, mage. True tests... **never** end." The creature had then laughed as I was pulled from the fade.

Suddenly I realized I was not alone, I turned to find a skinny man in the red robes of a senior enchanter robes with combed back brown hair and a large grin on his face.

I closed my I eyes and looked back at the sprawling city down below me arms crossed, "What a coincidence I was just thinking of you Mouse, don't you have some apprentices to scare or something"

"My movements are my own little mage, as you well know." The figures voice made the hairs on the back of my neck stand on end. "Anyway, it seems I am not the only one who has gone thru some changes in scenery in the past few days."

"Yes, I suppose so, what do you want Mouse, I won't let you possess me"

"Little mage, as hard as it will be for you to understand, unlike the rest of my kind I have no interest in the realm of mortals" suddenly the demon stood next to me on the plateau. "The trivialities of your world are worthless in my eyes."

I turned to look at the figure. It was hard to believe I could have ever thought this creature a weak failed apprentice. That was the danger with demons, layers of intrigue over blatant falsehoods, nothing could be trusted. Now all I could see was pure malice, and it terrified me to my core.

"You will awaken soon mage; I will continue to watch you for now, at least as long as you continue to amuse me." The demon began laugh maniacally as I felt myself being drawn from the fade, "Until our next meeting little mage, do try not to die before hand, your test has only just begun"

I woke suddenly, finding myself lying on a bedroll in the middle of a forest clearing near a smoldering fireplace, with a large dog staring down at me intently. I yelped and scrambled back from the hound who stared at me questioningly, Duncan and the other recruit turned, alert at the sudden noise however after seeing it was just me, went back to gathering up the campsite.

"Honestly if you're going to wake me up, use something other than a big, scary, slobbering dog monster" The dog only cocked its head, tongue at my words.

"I you don't want him to keep doing it, make the effort to wake up earlier like the rest of us." The other recruit said, tightening the straps on his armor before mounting his horse. "Now clear up and get on your horse, we're going" He then began to guide his mount back to the main road.

I turned to Duncan who had been watching our conversation silently from his own horse.

"That guy needs to get that stick out of his ass if he's going to be riding the whole way to Ostagar, what's his problem?"

"Don't take his attitude personally William, Gareth is dealing with his own demons at the moment and is merely lacks a target to point it at." He looked at the retreating recruits back as he disappeared into the copse of trees with a look of concern on his face. "His demons may not be as literal as the ones you mages face, however the burden they present is the same, give him time."

As he rode off after Gareth I got set to dusting myself off and stretching the kinks out of my back, the traveling clothes may not be as delicate as my old robes were, however they definitely were not as comfortable to fall into bed in.

I may not like it but Mouse was right of course, never mind how he seemed to know what I had been doing, I had gone through much since becoming a full mage. Worst of all was the thought of Jowan's betrayal still rankled; the lying bastard had used me in his attempt to leave the Circle, marry a chantry sister, Lily, and avoid the rite of tranquility, a ritual where his forehead would be branded with magic, severing his link to the fade and erasing his emotions, the thing all mages feared.

I assisted him, put my ass on the line, only to find out afterwards that he was a blood mage, a mage using demonic magic powered by life energy to do harm. He attacked the Templars and he escaped, and as we had just broken his phylactery, the Templars had no effective means of tracking him. Lily had rejected him for what he was; she was taken to Aeonar, the Mage prison. As for me, I was shoved in a really small, really dark room with little food or water for a week until Irving came to retrieve me, which would have been fine considering the other possibility was execution however I personally had issues with dark, confined spaces so in the end it was still a living hell of panic attacks and sniffling.

He had told me that I was chosen as a conscript by Duncan, a grey warden, who had come to the tower looking for mages to fight against the blight in the south, apparently Irving had told him of my situation and highlighted enough of my skills to make me sound impressive. He had also me some old clothes from the circle's storage room. Unlike the robes given to most mages, these clothes included a coat and trousers with heavy boots, apparently enchanted. He also promised me a staff which would be given to me upon leaving, seems the Templars still didn't trust that I wouldn't open my veins and go demon loving killing machine before I left. Irving had managed to get some of my personal effects such as my mother's locket and my journal.

Irving then led me from the Templar Cells and into the apprentice quarters, I remembered how only a few days earlier, this floor had been my home, where me and my friends would study, gossip, and try and generally try to avoid the prying eyes of the Templars.

"Will!" Irving and I turned around at the sudden noise as a young elf ran towards us, weaving through the sea of beds and people, the moment she reached us she threw her arms around and hugged me tightly. "I thought you were dead, when we hadn't heard anything of you".

I returned the hug, turning my head to look at Irving "First Enchanter can we have some privacy please?"

"Of course, I see nothing wrong with saying goodbyes, but don't tarry to long with Miss Surana, William, Duncan is waiting." He then walked off to talk with an enchanter looking after a small group of apprentices who couldn't have been older than six or seven. I realized looking at their faces that the last time I had been outside the small island on which the tower stood had been when I was around the age they were now, twelve years ago. Trying to shake off my trepidation I turned back to the elf who was still holding me tightly.

"Rayya, it's good to see you, I thought the worst when Gregoir told me he'd caught you." She had been in charge of distracting the Templars and getting them away from the phylactery chamber. She stepped back, brushing some loose dark hairs out of her face.

"It's true then, you're leaving the tower" A sad smile crept up on her lips

"Yeah it's true, the Templars would have killed me otherwise, but somehow Irving got a Grey Warden recruiter to take pity on me." It made sense in a way, for my age, I was considered very adept at the arcane arts especially fire magic, not a fact I was very proud of. Many enchanters considered me and Rayya two of some the most promising mages in the circle. "Are you going to be okay, though, I'm more worried about that"

"I'll be fine Will; Irving managed to talk down the Templars, apparently being the star student of the First Enchanter does count for something" she shrugged "I've also had my harrowing moved up, Irving wants to be completely sure the Templars can't touch me, still…" She stepped back and sat down on the bed next to me, signaling me to sit down on the spot next to her.

I sat down and placed my head in my hands. "What happened Rayya? What happened?" my hands were shaking remembering my time in the cell, so dark, so small, no don't think about that. "Jowan's a blood mage, a damned blood mage, he used me Rayya, used both of us.

"At least you're both free now." I looked up at her shocked, she just sat there staring at me eyes seething with jealousy. "He's free with no phylactery for the Templars to track him with, so what if his chantry loving girlfriend dumped, she wouldn't have stayed anyway not for long, at least now he's free. You too, Gray Wardens can't be touched, not by the Templars the Chantry, none of them! Meanwhile I'm still tucked away in this tower surrounded by sycophants and monsters wearing plate hiding behind faith and holy duty all while they continue to watch us! I wish I was as lucky as you two"

"Lucky, you think we were LUCKY!" I leapt up and turned to the small mage "Rayya, the Grey Wardens aren't an escape, I'm with them because my only other option is an executioner, if the darkspawn don't do it for them. Everything I know, everything I strived for all these years practicing, studying to become a mage, all of it gone the day after I get it, all because I trusted a man who I thought had been my best friend for over a decade! Jowan, lucky? He'll be hunted for the rest of his life, never able to stop running, spending each and every day looking over his shoulder for Templars, real or imagined." The girl was cringing now looking at me defensively.

"At least he's free…" she whispered, "We shouldn't have to live like that, none of us. Jowan ran because they would have made him tranquil by force, Irving told me. How can you defend the circle after all it's done to you, to Jowan, to me?"

"Because you don't know how the rest of the world sees us, monsters, things that at the drop of a hat can turn on everyone and everything they love and wipe it out with the swipe of a hand and a glance. Rayya you were born in the circle, thinking the outside world is so much better because you never saw it, well it's not." I lowered my head remembering the events that had led to my discovery by the Templars. "The worst part is that they're right, we can burn cities to the ground and if a demon gets a hold of us, then well you understand, you've seen it, but this is what we are, and I can't change it, all I can do is strive to be better. Goodbye Rayya, chances are we aren't going to see each other again.

I could hear sobs coming from behind me as I walked back to Irving, who was looking at me askance, "I take it things didn't end well between you two"

I gave a laughed dryly as we continued towards the entrance hall to the tower, "Yeah, what tipped you off sir, the yelling or the tears, listen First Enchanter, make sure she's okay for me but keep an eye on her, I don't want her to end up like Jowan did."

The old man nodded seriously "I cannot promise anything, I can keep the Templars from using the rite on her but beyond that I'm afraid her life is her own as well as any mistakes she may make along the way, she has much more potential than Jowan and that is intriguing, but also much more terrifying."

"At least you care sir, that's something" I responded as we reached the end of the hallway, opening the door I immediately noticed Duncan, or at least who I believed was Duncan, the dark skinned man had shoulder length hair pulled back in a ponytail, his white armor was of good make and the man carried a long sword as well as a dagger strapped to his back. What really identified him however was his demeanor, he had this kind of air about him, like a stern but compassionate uncle, however I could tell he could probably break me in half with a glare.

This man was a leader of men who could each be considered a hero in their own right, which meant something in its self. He was accompanied by a tall man leaning against the doorway to the hall in battered scale armor with a sword at his waist and a shield strapped to his back. I could only assume he was either another Grey warden or a recruit like me. He had short brown hair and days' worth of stubble on his face as well as a large dog which I recognized as a Mabari.

I'd never seen one of the dogs before; supposedly they were bred by a Tevinter mage, the dogs then defected towards the enemies of the empire, notably becoming symbols of status in Ferelden. The most noticeable thing I noticed about them however was that they were covered in bandages, the dog had a poultice strapped to his side. The man was covered in wounds, especially around his neck.

Duncan merely grinned and shook the First Enchanter's hand "I merely wished to meet this new recruit as quickly as possible" his accent marked him as a native Fereldan, I would have had him pegged as Rivaini from his skin. He released Irving's hand and turned my way a warm smile on his face. "You must be William, Irving speaks highly of you, if even half of what he has said of you is true you will proveto be a valuable asset against the darkspawn, and every mage is needed, a grey warden mage even more so."

Before he could go much further however the bandaged man piped up from the doorway "Duncan, we have your recruit, we should make for Ostagar as soon as possible, you promised as soon as he was ready."

The man just sighed and shook his head, "William, this is Gareth Cousland, Gareth, William Amell" The dog barked indignantly, "And this is Gareth's faithful hound Drey, forgive me" the hound nodded its head and sat down at Gareth's feet looking satisfied. I suppose the stories detailing Mabari intelligence weren't exaggerated after all.

A Templar entered the room carrying a long bundle neatly wrapped in cloth and handed off to the First Enchanter. Irving unwrapped the parcel to reveal a long redwood staff with runes carved along the shaft, and held it out to me looking tense. As I touched it I could feel heat radiating from it, hot, but a sort of pleasant warmth rather than scalding, and suddenly I felt as though I could run a mile.

Irving let out a small sigh looking relieved "Ahh, good, it seems you are compatible with it after all, I guess I will have to thank First Enchanter Sweeny after all, man's blind as a bat but he seems to know a bit about Magical affinities and the like, anyway he wandered in and came out hours later with the equipment, said something about a joke and a fire rod, I didn't need or want to know, he thought that you would be needing these"

"This staff was located within the deeper sections of the Circle storage rooms leaning on the box where your current clothes were found, we don't know who they belonged too, the records are vague on the facts, anyway they will be much more use with you then sitting in a dusty old room locked away."

I grabbed the elderly man in a strong hug, he stiffened and then awkwardly returned it, the man may be drone on sometimes but he took me in when I had no one else at the circle and taught me all about the joys of magic, not just the burdens like most teachers.

As I turned to leave for the door staff in hand, Irving spoke up one last time

"William, you will go far in this world, but be careful, the world is not forgiving to our kind, good luck my boy."

I stopped and looked at my new staff, some of the runes seemed to be glowing, "Hey First Enchanter, why did you try so hard not to touch this staff"

The man looked taken aback and turned beet red, if you weren't compatible, small chance though it was, some magical items can have a nasty backlash effect, especially custom made items like that staff"

I frowned, "Like what, exactly"

"Well" It didn't seem possible but the old man managed to look more embarrassed, "We couldn't be sure but Sweeny believed that the staff would either explode or you yourself would catch fire"

I felt tears run down the sides of my face as I laughed the whole way to the boat, I felt a large hand on my shoulder, and looked around to see Gareth staring down at me, Maker he was tall, without saying a word he patted my back and stepped into the boat with Duncan, his hound leaping in after him and settling at his feet.

So at least he wasn't a total ass I suppose, it felt nice knowing that the start of my adventure was a friendly gesture at least.

**-Gareth Cousland-**

We'd been riding for several hours in relative silence along the main road, Duncan leading the procession with the mage lagging behind; Drey was trotting at my side at a steady pace. The mage had seemed deep in thought since this waking and had been writing notes in a small book, a journal perhaps. It didn't really matter to me as long as we finally got moving south, it had been three days since leaving the circle and Duncan said we would be arriving in 3 days or so, faster if shortcuts he knew of still existed.

As long as I found Fergus I would be fine. Going out of our way to travel to the circle had taken days which hadn't helped my mood much.

The mage had so made himself useful, healing mine and Drey's numerous wounds, albeit leaving some nasty scars, he apologized and said that some wounds including the one on my neck had been left to long, I didn't mind much, the scar was a good reminder, I wasn't invincible. The wound had continued bleeding for several days, Duncan said it was a miracle I was still alive.

Other than healing and lighting however the mage proved to be wanting in just about every other respect, he had lived comfortably his whole life, and had camp life didn't seem to agree with him. He rejected the whole stereotypical studious outlook most people believed embodied mages, he seemed more animated than I had expected. He also seemed surprised by every little thing, I chalked it up to living in a tower for years.

"Halt"

Duncan's voice cut through the silence as he suddenly stopped and raised his hand, I pulled up next to him and glanced at him, his face was dark yet he seemed more surprised than anything else.

"What is it Duncan, why have we stopped?"

"I'm not sure, I sense the presence of the taint somewhere in the area nearby."

The mage certainly perked up as he heard the news slipping his book into his satchel, "Darkspawn, but I thought they were all down south"

"I'm not sure what it is William, the presence of the taint is there but it doesn't feel like darkspawn, I can't explain it." He turned his horse in the direction of the forest and pointed at both me and the mage, "Whatever it is, we will need to find it and see it dealt with before we move on, if this is a darkspawn party somehow shielding itself we cannot let it go unchecked."

I hated the idea of delaying our journey even more but Duncan did have a point, the horde in the south wasn't moving anywhere yet and any advance scouts would need to be dealt with, Fergus would have to wait.

Hand on my sword's hilt, I noticed the mage tense and pull his staff from his stirrup. Duncan was the only one who seemed at peace but I could tell it was just a projection, Duncan was worried, and if he was, then we had every right to be as well.

"Well, let's go" With a look at each of us Duncan rode off into the woods, The sun began to set slowly as we followed him into the darkness.

-END

A/N: All right that's the second chapter down, sorry about the slow start up, Mahariel joins the group next chapter. I'm also still working on an schedule since its summer and even with work I still end up with a lot of free time. Best guess is about 5 days to a week unless something comes up, always good to have some sort of timeline. Thanks for reading and following along, its a huge motivation, and as always please leave any reviews and comments you might have, your input, positive and negative, helps make my writing better.


	3. Chapter 3

DARKNESS FALLS

**-Nessa Mahariel-**

"TAMLEN DON"T!"

My voice cried out as I woke up in the darkness of a large tent on a plush cot, on closer inspection I recognized many of the surrounding artifacts and texts and realized that I was inside of Keeper Marethari's tent. As I sat up I found that I was wearing nothing but my smallclothes, some clean leggings were folded next to the bed along with a thick linen shirt along with a few flowers and wreathes.

Closing my eyes, I could also hear voices outside the tent; however I also could also make out some stranger voices somewhere nearby as well, though I couldn't tell where, it sounded almost as if they were singing. It was all wrong, the last thing I remembered was Tamlen yelling for help, screaming that something in the mirror could see him after touching that strange mirror, than there was a flash of light and then nothing. How did I wake up here?

Getting out of the bed awkwardly, I slipped on the clothes, noticing a strange patch of bruises near my elbow, strange, my other wounds that I'd sustained in the ruins were gone, a few bruises shouldn't have mattered. I made for the entrance flap, pulling it open and cringing at the sudden abundance of sunlight, shielding my eyes I could make out that I was somehow back at the camp, the colorful banners and tarps flowing along the sides of brightly painted wagons, the sound of children playing at the side, a group of hunters talking a short ways away. One of hunters suddenly turned around and caught sight of me, his face lit up as he made his way quickly over to the tent. I walked out to greet him halfway.

"Your awake, you've the gods own luck lethallan, your back at camp, everyone was worried sick about you, how do you feel?"

"Fenarel, what happened? How did I get here, where's Tamlen?"

"Lethallan from what I know you were brought back by a group of Grey Wardens who passed near where you fell, you were wounded and very sick, the keeper said you are fortunate to still be with us, thank the creators"

"Grey Wardens, wait what, there are Grey Wardens, here?!"

"Yes, three humans and a big dog, they're staying in a small clearing just outside of the camp, the keeper felt it best to separate them from the rest of the clan."

"This was all wrong, I was saved by humans, wait they brought me back, where is Tamlen, why haven't you mentioned him, is he alright?"

The young elf suddenly looked crestfallen and bowed his head as if trying to find the right words to say. "Lethallan, the Gray Wardens only brought you back, when we asked about Tamlen they said they only found you, that there was no sign of anyone else nearthe ruins, the lead warden said something about darkspawn and the taint, than they left with the keeper to show her where they found you. That was two days ago" a pained look crossed his face again, "I'm sorry, we had all of our hunters comb the forest once they got back and the keeper said the danger was dealt with but we couldn't find a trace of him"

"No, No he was with me, right there next to me, he can't be gone!" Tamlen was, is, one of our clans best hunters, he was my best friend, would have been, no, he couldn't be gone

Fenarel came closer and put a comforting arm around my shoulders. "Let's go to the keeper, she wanted to speak with you as soon as you woke up, please, she'll have more information than I can give, it will be all right"

No it wouldn't, but I steadied myself and let him guide me, hand on my shoulder to another small campsite near the edge of the encampment. My clan mates kept coming up to us along the way, greeting me, asking if I was well, and giving condolences. I think I was just giving responses halfheartedly putting on a brave face.

As we neared the tent that was set up, the first thing I noticed was the large hound that bounded up to us. I stepped back, I'd always been more of a cat person, dogs were sometimes used to hunt the Dalish when humans came seeking blood and I still had bad memories. After a few sniffs the dog barked and bounded back to a human male dressed in fine looking leather trousers and a woolen shirt with sleeves rolled back sitting on a log near the entrance of the tent cleaning pieces of armor and settled at his feet. The human looked up at us and I cringed a little inside when he set his sights on me, the man's eyes were too cold and focused for someone barely into adulthood, by human standards he probably wasn't much older then myself. Looking to the side I could see another dark haired human in a long coat leaning against a tree with a staff leaning at his side, scribbling in a small leather-bound book humming a tune keeping an eye on us.

Noticing my discomfort, Fenarel stepped in front trying of me and stood up straight trying to look intimidating however I noticed a slight quaking in his voice when he spoke, "Wardens, the one you brought back to us has woken up, our keeper wished to speak with her as soon as she did", the wardens looked at each other and then back at us.

"She's in the tent with our Warden Commander Duncan, at the moment, I'll let her know you're here" The human on the log put down the shoulder piece he was shining and stood up, by the creators he towered over us, easily one of the taller humans I'd ever seen, the pressure he gave off however, made him seem even bigger, the man moved to the tent entrance and stuck his head in, after a few muffled words he was pushed to the side by a small figure that ran straight at me and threw herself at me, before I could do more than gasp I was caught in a crushing embrace with enough force to put us on the ground.

"Merrill, calm down, Merrill I can't breathe" all I could feel her shaking as she looked up at me with teary eyes.

"Nessa, your alive, I mean the keeper said you would wake up but you were just so sick and with Tamlen gone, I couldn't lose you too." All I could do was start stroking her back slowly, in all the activity I'd forgotten how Merrill would feel about all this.

Merrill was always a bit of a social outcast to most of the clan except for Keeper Marethari but a shared love of history brought us together, Tamlen joined us soon after and while I was on good terms with pretty much everyone else in the clan, Merrill had just lost a good third of her whole world with Tamlen's death.

"Da'len" the keeper's voice broke through the new well of grief as she stepped out of the tent, the elderly woman was accompanied out by a dark skinned human in elaborate armor. I picked myself and Merrill up onto our feet, Merrill still a little unsteady, clinging tightly to my arm.

"It is a comfort to know you are still among us, I had my doubts on your chances of survival even with my treatment. Perhaps we should talk later, give you time too…" The grey warden commander, or Duncan the tall human had said he was called, stepped forward.

"I'm sorry but there are pressing matters, keeper Marethari, that must be attended to, first of all I would like to hear this young woman's tale of how she and her friend came to be near those ruins. Any information at all would help me piece together what happened."

"Duncan, she has just been through a terrifying ordeal and lost someone precious to her, she needs time." I appreciated the keeper's words and while I was far from fine, the shem was right. If Duncan could help me shed light on what happened then I could accept his help.

"Fine but one thing first, keeper, is there any chance that Tamlen is alive, any at all?" I asked, a note of desperation in my voice. The keeper took a moment and gave me a sad look.

"I'm sorry da'len, I was only narrowly able to save your life from the sickness, Duncan can go further into detail about this after you tell us what transpired. If Tamlen did survive, it is unlikely he escaped the same illness and without treatment or any of the advantages you had, I doubt he would have lasted this long, Paivel is seeing to his funeral preparations.

"Merrill buried her face in her hands with renewed sobs, and I could see the two humans behind Duncan give sympathetic looks, I didn't need pity not from them, members of their kind started all of this shit. I took seat on the log that the tall shem had vacated.

I then proceeded to tell the story of how I had dodged my responsibilities for that day to join Tamlen on a late night patrol around the camp, how we'd seen some humans running through the forest, we'd stopped them and found that they were running from some type of demon or some nonsense in some elven ruins. I'd wanted to kill them but Tamlen convinced me that they weren't worth our time and we moved to check on their story. Beyond a few wild animals, including a twisted creature in the final room of the ruin. After we'd somehow managed to take it down, Tamlen became entranced by a mirror-like object , I'd tried to stop him when he made to touch it but didn't get to him in time. He told me that he was looking into a whole other place through the mirror, but described a dark presence; he became hysterical, screaming that it had noticed him, and when I pulled him away from the mirror a sudden burst of light knocked me out.

As I finished my story, the grey warden brought his hand to his chin looking pensive. He nodded then looked back to me. "If what you've told me is true then we were right to suspect the mirror as the source of this event, the creature you described was a bear, likely infected with the blight, a virulent disease inherent to the dark spawn horde, by the time we had gotten to the room however the corpse was little more than bones, I needed this to be sure."

"I can't pretend to understand the bear bit what about the mirror, what was that?" I asked, the human sounded as if he knew what he was talking about but grey warden or not, I had trouble believing it. Our clan knew of the blight in the southern reaches of the country, which was why we were endeavoring to travel north to Gwaren and take ship to the Free Marches, a long and arduous journey but necessary, we had no wish to test our hunters against the darkspawn.

"I can answer that question da'len" the keeper picked a worn book off of a nearby desk and carefully opened it to reveal an almost perfect sketch of the mirror. "The mirror as you refer to it is to the best of my knowledge an eluvian, a relic crafted by the old elves of Arlathan, portals for communication and perhaps even teleportation across long distances between the cities of their nation in seconds."

"Then why did it respond like that, Tamlen and I were members of the people, descendants of the Dales, wouldn't it have recognized us?"

"I'm afraid that might well be what happened" Duncan suddenly cut in, "I believe that the relic was corrupted through its close proximity to the taint, taking on its qualities, when you and this Tamlen discovered the mirror, it reached out to you through contact, infected you with the taint."

"So what happened to the mirror, if it's such a danger, we could use it to find out what happened to Tamlen, so we can at least find him." I pointed out hopefully.

"I'm afraid that such a thing is impossible, the mirror's level of corruption was considerable, if we had left it unchecked the entire forest might have fallen to the blight." Suddenly his face took on a stony, determined look "As a grey warden I could not let that happen, I consulted with your keeper and with her help destroyed the relic."

I looked at both of them aghast, the keeper most of all, I noticed Merrill was staring daggers at her back. "How could you allow that, keeper that mirror was a link to our history, a link to finding Tamlen, how could you, on the word of a shem!?"

Her response was calm but her eyes could melt eye with their heat.

I noted that I was trying to shrink down into my seat as much as I could. I hadn't earned the keepers ire in years, I have been alive for twenty years, and adult submitted to the blood writing, however under her knowing gaze I became little more than a child who had spoken out of turn, even Duncan backed off a little.

"I did what was right for the clan da'len as a guide and as a leader in such matters, I eliminated a threat to the clan which had already taken a member of those I am sworn to protect, protect just as your father once did, and had almost taken another, I won't as forgiveness, but I ask you to understand." She then turned to Merrill who was at that moment to trying to blend into the canvas of the tent. "You as well Merrill, my responsibilities will one day be your own, I would have you learn from this." Merrill looked as if she would try to stand up to her but soon her eyes dropped down in shame.

"Speaking of present dangers, Keeper, we must get to the next matter, which concerns her greatly" he then looked at me with a curious look, judging me, I didn't like it.

"What do you mean by "Concerns me", warden". I stared right back at him, a defiant look on my face, "You already broke the mirror, and I'm fine, what else is there, what's your point?"

"My point, is that you are not cured" he moved faster then I even believed possible for a someone his age, grabbing my arm in a gently but iron grip and pulling up the sleeve. Fenarel shouted reaching for the curved swords at his sides while Merrill's hand caught fire, her arm pointed at Duncan, suddenly the two other wardens burst into the tent responding to the commotion, the mage had his staff drawn pointing it at Merrill looking nervously at Duncan, the other one carried a long sword in both hands, runes stamped along the blade near the hilt and obviously enchanted, calmly focused on Fenarel, waiting for him to make a move. The dog stalked in growling at his masters feet waiting to pounce.

"STOP!" the combined voices of both the keeper and the warden commander reverberated through the tent, both were staring angrily at their respective charges. The wardens lowered their weapons and exited the tent, Fenarel betrayed a short breath, Merril lowered her arm.

Still glaring at his recruits retreating backs, Duncan slowly pulled the sleeve past my elbow revealing the bruise, "As I was saying, you have not been cured" he said calmly, releasing my arm.

"It's just a bruise, what of it?" I retorted angrily, wary of him. Growing up I'd heard the stories told about grey wardens by our hahren, Paivel, around his campfire, as had every child in the clan. An order made up entirely of great warriors and powerful mages, fighting the stuff of nightmares in the dark depths of the deep roads. These stories became legends among the small, with Garahel, the elven grey warden led the charge against the blight who slew the last archdemon taking the lead in hero worship. I couldn't even follow him.

"The bruises are just the first sign, your keeper was able to isolate the corruption and slow it. This is only a stop-gap measure which at best has bought you two, three weeks at most."

Merrill clapped a hand over her mouth while Fenarel muttered a quiet curse.

"Eventually the corruption will spread freely through your veins, you would lose yourself physically and mentally, if you're lucky, a painful death awaits you, if not, you'll become a ghoul, twisted to the darkspawn's will and your clan…" he looked to the keeper eyes stony "will be forced to put you down" I couldn't breathe, all of the noise in the tent faded into the background, my knuckles stood out white as I clasped my hands together, suddenly all I could hear was the pounding of my heart, and the strange singing at the edge of my awareness. Burying my head in my hands I tried to shut the sound out but if anything it got louder. "You hear them, that sound is the call of the old gods, the call to war and death and pain

"However there are options open to you" I looked up to find Duncan kneeling down in front of me, eyes sympathetic. "I have been speaking to your keeper; and have had my recruits ask around the camp as well, you are by all accounts the most skilled huntress within this clan, skills such as yours will be sorely needed in the coming days"

Such heavy praise, I was a Dalish trained woodsman which I suppose did put me heads and shoulders above human standards. And I could outshoot any of the other hunters during Clan festivals, beyond that my skills weren't to impressive, I had my mother's hunting dagger but I never was able to get the hang of close combat, that was Tamlen's forte. The memory of Tamlen brought on new waves of pain, but I pushed it down.

"What's your point?"

"If you wish it, I can give you a chance at living, it's not a cure, not really, and it may end your life as surely as the blight will, but if successful, it will be a hard life but it will extend the time you have considerably."

He hesitated, and then offered his hand towards me "Nessa Mahariel, I offer you a place within the Gray Wardens, know that if you accept, your life will never be the same, being a grey warden is a calling, not a choice." I couldn't believe what I was hearing, me a grey warden, that was impossible, I was no hero, no great warrior.

Sudden realization hit me like a punch to the gut, "If I go, will I ever be able to return to the clan?"

I felt the keepers hand on my shoulder, I looked up into her grandmotherly face, "I truly do not know, Da'len, but we could not watch you suffer, the grey wardens offer you a chance to survive."

"Let me be perfectly clear" Duncan stated seriously "You will likely never return here, we go to fight the darkspawn hordes to the south, a battle that will take you far from your clan, I will admit that my motives are not entirely charitable, I need you and people like you such as the two men traveling with me already."

"Why should we trust anything you say, keeper what if he's wrong?" I interjected looking to Marethari desperately, hopefully.

"I cannot be sure, Nessa, but what I do know that is if this new blight isn't stopped, if the danger rising in the south persists, nowhere will be safe. Long ago the Dalish made an agreement to fight alongside the wardens against a blight if the need arose, it is time to honor their agreement. It breaks my heart to send you away from us, just as it would to see you die slowly of sickness. This is your duty and your salvation?

I was nervous, afraid, angry, sad, but I understood that if I wanted to live and find justice for Tamlen and safety for my clan, the darkspawn had to be stopped. Joining the wardens was my best and only shot to do this and at least Duncan was being perfectly honest about my chances. He could have lied I suppose, make it easier for me to say yes, I appreciated his candor if nothing else.

"Fine, if it's my duty to join you then I will, let it be done" I said, firmly clasping the humans hand, Duncan visibly sighed with relief releasing my hand. "Then I welcome you Nessa, the Dalish are rare within our ranks, but those that are have always only ever served with distinction, you will undoubtedly do the same."

The keeper smiled sadly and took off a small ring carved from halla horn, small inscriptions covered the band, she held it out to me, "Da'len take this ring, it belonged to your father before he passed, let it stand as a symbol of your heritage and where you came from. It will protect you during this coming darkness" I took the ring and placed it around my ring finger, the band felt warm against my skin. At the edge of my vision I could see Fenarel standing awestruck while Merrill stalked out quickly head down.

"I'm sorry Duncan, if it's alright, I would like to at least stay for Tamlen's funeral and say my goodbyes."

"We have ground to cover before reaching the army camps at Ostagar and we have delayed long already, however I could not in good conscious deny you this, however afterwards we must go, we have delayed a great deal already and the need for us there grows with each passing day.

With that he exited the tent, the keeper followed behind him turning her head to look at me, then went through the flap of the tent leaving me alone with only the singing voices of the darkspawn for company.

-END

Elven Translation

Da'len (dah-LEN): little child

Eluvian (ehl-LOO-vee-ehn): mirror

Hahren (hah-REHN): Elder

Lethallan (leth-ah-LAHN): "cousin" or "clansman", friendly term for a familiar

A/N: Alright, we've finally met each of the characters, I am probably going to continue along the last part of origin in the first part of the next chapter, and then it's off to Ostagar and the blight. Nessa belongs to a friend of mine, I myself have never played this origin and this was a good chance to do so. The origins are pretty easy to write with such a clear direction, meaning I can churn them out pretty quickly, I doubt it will be as easy once I start delving into the plot especially with the fall semester around the corner. Despite this, all in all I've had more fun with this story then I thought I would. Thank you all for reading and for your reviews, this is huge motivation to continue. I promise things will start speeding up soon.


	4. Chapter 4

THE ARRIVAL

**-Nessa Mahariel-**

It felt wrong, me standing here in the failing sun in front of the new sapling being planted in Tamlen's honor, we did not burn our dead like the shems or inter our fallen in stones like a durgen'len, cut off from the world.

We promote new life, burying our dead and planting a tree over their grave, as they fade away, new life is born from our loss. This tree however would receive no such nourishment as no body had been found; the funeral as a result was just a traditional gesture.

As the elders chanted the ancient rites, guiding Tamlen's soul to the Creators, the keeper had all of Tamlen's possessions sorted and displayed, the clan could not afford to waste any resources and only items of great personal valuewould be left to his kin, the rest would be distributed to those who needed them most or traded for coin and supplies. I'd seen it happen many times, clan members dying of disease, old age, or violence, their bodies buried and every trace of them given to the clan, this was the first time I had ever lost someone close to me however, I was just an infant when my parents died, I felt a hollow feeling in my chest.

I had been receiving many farewells and kind words from the clan, however I could also see the shadow of blame in their eyes. Looking across the small clearing that had been chosen for the ceremony. Tamlen's parents were speaking to the keeper, his mother had been shooting hateful glances at me ever since I visited her at their tent, she had screamed at me, blaming me for dragging Tamlen into those ruins, all while his father just stared at me, hate burning in his eyes. Just a few days earlier the two of them had been dropping unsubtle hints that they wanted me as a daughter in law, much to both Tamlen and my embarrassment.

The feelings had spread quickly among the older members of the clan, the Dalish looked down on any action that resulted in the death of a young clansman, even more so with one as talented as Tamlen. I just felt betrayed, it wasn't my fault, I was incredibly interested in any piece of my people's history so yes I wanted to see the ruins but even I was wary of the eluvian when we found it, but I didn't have the heart to tell everyone that it was Tamlen who touched the mirror despite my protests, I would not sully Tamlen's memory even if mine suffered. I contemplated going off to find Merril, who'd been missing ever since I accepted Duncan's offer to join the Wardens, when a familiar voice called out from behind me.

I turned around and saw Ashalle, my guardian, walking through the crowd of mourners a satchel slung over her shoulder, embracing me as I ran to greet her halfway. Pulling back she looked me up and down with a warm smile lighting up her face.

"By the Creators it is so good to see you whole and well" Ashalle was a friend of my parents and had taken me in after their deaths. She was the closest thing to a mother I had growing up.

"Anath ara, Ashalle, it's good to see you too." I couldn't believe I'd almost considered leaving a note saying goodbye, Ashalle deserved more than that, my fear had been however that she would have blamed me like the others, judging from her face however this wasn't the case.

"When the wardens brought you back I was so afraid, the keeper didn't know if you would live or die, I would have greeted you however one of the hunters came back with an injury that needed tending to."

"Ashalle,it's all right, I'm fine, or at least fine enough for now." I replied shrugging my shoulders a sad smile on my face. "Has the keeper told you what I must do?"

Ashalle's smile drooped quickly, "Yes, she told me about what Duncan was planning to offer you shortly after she determined you'd live, I've also discussed it with the man himself, though he wouldn't give me any details on this cure." She looked over at the edge of the clearing where Duncan and his recruits stood with their horses waiting for me. "He seems honorable for a shemlen."

"Honorable or not he has me in a corner, say no I die horribly, say yes, chances are I'll probably die horribly or be stuck with a bunch of humans my whole life."

"It's not as if you'll be alone, there are many elves among the Gray Wardens"

"They're not clan though, even if I meet a Dalish it wouldn't be the same, though…" I looked around at the assembled clan members, it wasn't obvious but I could tell from the way people moved around me, sending glances my way. "I can't say I'm feeling very accepted at the moment" I could feel myself tearing up, I hated crying damn you Tamlen why'd you have to disappear. I felt Ashalle put her hand on my cheek, "Hush, da'len, the clan will come around, the pain of losing such a valued clan mate is affecting everyone."

"I hope your right. I just wish things didn't end like this."

"You'll face hard times ahead, but you are Dalish, our path has always been the difficult one, We are the Dalish: keepers of the lost lore, walkers of the lonely path. We are the last of the Elvhenan, and never again shall we submit." The ancient oath rang in my ears, I had heard it many times since first saying it during the blood writing ritual where I earned my tattoos and the right to call myself a true member of the Dalish. "I have something for you, so you may remember where you come from in the coming days" She reached into the sack at her waist and brought out a forest green cloak woven with a strange material. Taking in my hands it felt light as air but durable, it was strange, like holding water in its liquid state. "This cloak is a relic from Artlathan, the keeper thought you would have need of it.

"Ashalle I…" I was at a loss, this was a great gift, a piece of our people's history, and it was mine.

"Keep it Da'len, I don't approve of this, can't say your parents very much would either, but if this is what the Creators willed, be safe and make us proud."

"Nessa Mahariel come forward" the keepers voice reverberated over the hushed conversations and mourning.

Taking one last look at Ashalle, I draped the cloak over my shoulders and slowly made my way to where the keeper stood, surrounded by other elders. I could feel the eyes of the entire clan on me, as I stood in front of her. Off to the side, Merrill stood silent, watching me sadly, I could tell she'd been crying.

"Child of the Dales, you leave to face an enemy which threatens our world, you didn't ask for this, and we are loath to bid farewell to another child of our clan this day, before the creators guide you from us, let your clan embrace you one last time." As she spoke the clan moved to create a path to the wardens. As I walked along I was treated to sad smiles, waves from friends and hunting partners, as well as more glares, however what hit worst was Merrill running out of the crowd and throwing her arms around me sobbing.

"Merrill it will be fine, I have to do this." I said returning the gesture.

"It's not fine, none of this is fine, this shouldn't be happening, not to you, not to Tamlen, any of this. You two were going to be bonded, raise a family, be happy together. Tamlens dead or missing or I don't even know, and you're leaving us like your never coming back."

"No, your right it isn't fine, I'm terrified, but this is how things are now, even if we wish for something different." I stepped back and looked into her eyes, "Things look bad but I believe we all have a place where we belong, I realize now that my place is no longer here, but elsewhere."

I turned to continue on with my march and heard a soft whimper.

"But I'm all alone now, Nessa, what do I do now."

"You find your place Merril, find where you belong and don't look back" I bowed my head refusing to look back, "And remember me won't you" I got on the horse next to Duncan already saddled with my meager belongings, and as we moved through the forest back to the main road, I was thankful I had drawn my hood up so these shems wouldn't see my tears.

**-William Amell- **

_Two Days Later_

At the start of this this journey I had expected it to before the most part dangerous, challenging, and uncomfortable. That was fine, what I wasn't prepared for was my traveling companions. Duncan was okay but he was always so serious, at least he had a sense of humor however, unfortunately I hadn't had the same luck with the other recruits who I was supposed to be working with.

Gareth was being his same moody self so no joking or fun side conversations with him, thank Andraste for some consistency on that front, which had only gotten worse as we delayed at the Dalish camp. He also had that stick shoved so far up his ass I was surprised he could bend down at all. Over the course of this entire trip he had barely said more than a few words to me, usually just dry comments about how I needed to learn how to look after myself. I still barely knew anything about him other than the fact that his last name was Cousland, I remembered the name as one belonging to an esteemed family but knew little else.

I couldn't shake the feeling that he wasn't always so dour however; I'd been sneaking glances at him smiling when he played with his hound and I still recalled the comforting hand on my shoulder as we left the tower. So he had a good heart, unfortunately it was just buried under a layer of pain and sadness, maybe Duncan was right and he just had to work through it.

The elf girl, Nessa, I learned was a completely different story. I'd been surprised when Duncan announced after that tense situation in the tent that she was going to be coming along with us, and I stupidly thought, hey this is a chance to make a friend. I then learned however that where Gareth was grumpy, she was just downright hateful. She was quite pretty, long wavy brown hair, pale skin, and beautiful tattoos along the sides of her face. Plus she did not seem much older than I was.

I remembered my one and only attempt to talk with her, if you could call it that, as we set down camp for the night the day we left the camp. I had just left the circle, she just left her clan, I was feeling sympathetic and she was just sitting off on her own by a small fire she'd made. I introduced myself and said it was glad to have her along with a big smile on my face, and all she'd done was glare at me and mutter something in the elven language, which, though I was unfamiliar with, seemed to me to mean "Fuck off human". Ever since then she'd continued her trend of sleeping as far from the rest of us as possible in her own little camp site and didn't say a word, also endeavoring to follow at a distance as we continued down the main road.

I might have been new to this whole traveling and roughing it thing in a group, but even I could tell something was wrong when the most social member of the party besides me was the dog. At least I could say I've been to a Dalish Camp, I'd read books which described the Dalish as crude, savage elves preying on weary travelers, however the clan we visited had proved otherwise, while suspicious, I had gotten some information about their customs from talking to some of the younger members, though I will admit that I'd had to use Drey as a sacrifice to their childlike imaginations. It was also the one opportunity that I had made Gareth laugh, when the hound trotted up to him whining with flowers, wreaths, and ribbons tied into his fur, the man merely stared and then burst out laughing, it was a good sound, but ended all to soon when he saw me looking.

As we crested a hill overlooking a valley, I finally caught a glimpse of Ostagar itself, the ruins themselves were massive, cresting the hillside and extending into the valley below intimidating and beautiful at the same time. The valley itself was filled to bursting with a sea of brightly colored tents banners declaring who was from where, almost like the tents the Dalish used but on a much greater scale. I could hear the sounds of the army down below us, singing, shouting, with the hammering of the forges to round it all out. As we passed by a large tower in the process of being renovated, we were greeted to the sight of a small group of armored knights came marching out to greet us, Gareth and Duncan just sat there calmly but I could see Nessa tense up a bit. "Ho there Duncan" As we dismounted a handsome man with long blonde hair in heavy plate varnished in gold and an ornate sword slung over his back and obviously the leader, walked up to Duncan and clasped his hand in a tight grip.

Duncan tightened his grip as well, a look of surprise on his face "King Cailan I didn't expect…"

"A royal welcome" the man interrupted, an easy smile dominating his features. My mouth dropped, this man was the king of Ferelden, all of Ferelden and we were meeting him. I'd known the Grey Wardens were respected but still to see it was another thing entirely. "I was beginning to think you would miss all the fun!"

"Not if I could help it your majesty" Duncan replied

"You don't have to be so formal Ducan, we'll be shedding blood together after all," This man did certainly have the charisma of a king if nothing else "Anyway, then I'll have the mighty Duncan at my side after all, glorious!" Looking over Duncan's shoulders he seemed to finally notice the rest of us. "Ah, the other wardens told me you were off recruiting, though not much else, I take it this is them?"

"Indeed your Majesty, may I introduce William Amell of the Circle of Magi, Nessa Mahariel of the Sabrae Dalish Clan, and Gareth Cousland of Highever."

"Cousland?" The king looked shocked and walked straight past Duncan looking up into Gareth's face, who bowed his head respectfully. "Your Bryce's youngest then, your brother has arrived with Highever's men, but we're still waiting on your father, has there been some delay?"

"Wait, do you not even know?" Gareth asked shocked

"No I'm sorry, news from up North has been unreliable of late with the horde on our doorstep, no one knows what to believe, has something happened?"

"Teryn Cousland and his wife are dead your majesty" Duncan interjected quickly, seeing the pain on Gareth's face. "Arl Howe had shown himself a traitor, and has overtaken Highever Castle. Had we not escaped, he would have killed us, and told you any story he wished."

I looked from Duncan to Gareth whose fist was clenched so tightly I could hear the metal gauntlet groaning, so this was what he was dealing with, suddenly his attitude and his desire to get to Ostagar as quickly as possible made a lot more sense. His entire family gone, with only his brother and his dog left, I couldn't imagine what he must be feeling. I noticed Nessa shoot a glance at Gareth, a look of surprise on her face.

The king turned away shaking his head in disbelief.

"I… can scarcely believe it! How could he think he could get away with such treachery?!" He turned back to Gareth angrily, "As soon as we are done here, I will turn my armies north and march on Highever Castle and bring Howe to justice, he will not profit from your family's deaths I swear it!"

"Is there nothing you could do sooner?" Gareth growled venom dripping off every word.

"I am sorry but at the moment our focus must remain on the darkspawn horde, no doubt you wish to see your brother, however I'm afraid he is scouting the wilds for signs of Darkspawn corruption further inland and will be out of contact until the battles end. I can only suggest you vent your grief against the darkspawn for the time being."

Gareth's face contorted "What do you know of my grief?"

Duncan stepped between them glaring at him, "Gareth that is unworthy of you" The king however put his hand on Duncan's shoulder pulling him back,

"Duncan it is okay, he is right, I cannot know of his situation but I can work to understand it, he is merely distraught." Giving Gareth a sad look he turned to Me and Nessa trying to bring back his previous excitement. "You're a mage are you not?

I stiffened and struggled to find the right words, "uh…yes your majesty I am"

"Splendid!" He announced heartily slapping me on the back, by the maker he's stronger then he looked. "Every mage is needed against the darkspawn, as I'm sure Duncan has told you, I'm certain your talents will come in handy."

"I hope so sir, I mean your highness" He gave me a reassuring smile and looked to Nessa who was trying to be as unnoticeable as possible.

So my lady, you are a member of the Dalish, I hear your people possess remarkable skill and honor, I'm glad you choose to commit yourself to our cause." Nessa merely grimaced and glared back at him.

"And here I thought you human lords merely thought of us as vagrants and thieves, dangerous bandits."

Cailan was looking uncomfortable now from where I stood, "Well to be fair your people can be a bit… standoffish, not that I blame them of course, they have their reasons surely. However I can say that you are welcome here in this camp, the Grey wardens will benefit greatly having you."

The king then moved back to Duncan speaking of fighting a huge battle that bards would sing of and then announced that he had to leave us to discuss strategy with some man named Lohgain. As he bid farewell Duncan merely nodded his head slowly and then turned back to face us.

"Well that could have gone better, I suppose" he sighed looking at Gareth and Nessa with an exasperated look.

"Is it true what the king said, about how this might not even be a true blight?" I piped up looking to diffuse the situation. Duncan's face darkened substantially and he motioned for us to walk with him to a large bridge.

"What the king says is somewhat true, we have won three battles against the darkspawn," Gareth piped up from the back of the group, "Yet you don't sound to reassured" Duncan merely looked at each of us and continued on "Do not be fooled, this is a blight and the archdemon is at work, however I cannot ask an army to move simply on my feelings or those of the other wardens no matter how much respect we have gained, the battles before however were merely the darkspawn testing our defenses and the horde grows larger each day, by now they look to outnumber us" We came to a stop at the entrance to the bridge leading into the kings camp. "

"It is because of this I believe we should continue on with the joining ritual straight away."

"What do you mean what ritual?" Nessa asked suspiciously, "I was told there would be a cure from the taint involved, then I would serve with the wardens, no one said anything about a ritual." I could see a similar look of concern on Gareth's face and knew my own held no more confidence than his.

"The cure and the ritual are the same, I cannot say more, it is brief but some preparation is required. We will speak more of it later, now explore the camp, but do not stray far, Nessa, as this is your first time being among so many people I would have you stay close to Gareth, he will be going to the king's forge to leave his armor to be repaired and then I would like for you to move around the camp, there is also two other recruits here besides yourselves, perhaps you can try to find them while you're at it then make your way to my campsite" The two other recruits looked at each other with hard looks at each other and then stormed off, Drey made to follow his master but Duncan stopped him with a hand and a quick shake of his head, Drey whined but sat down on his haunches. Seriously just how smart was this dog.

"Are you sure that was a good idea, I could have gone with her if she needed watching." I said offhand once I was sure they couldn't overhear us, I made sure to account for elf hearing as well. Duncan merely looked back at me and folded his arms. "I needed her watched this is still a dangerous place even if it is on our side, and I don't trust her around so many humans alone. Gareth will be able to keep an eye on her without drawing the attention of the Templars if any trouble starts."

All I could do was shrug "Makes sense I suppose, from all I've seen of the man, anyone who would even try messing with a guy like Gareth even without his armor deserves it I suppose. I just hope they don't tear each other apart" Duncan laughed dryly at the comment. "From what the keeper told me Nessa has some bad experiences with humans in the past, and I would like to see some headway taken towards making her more comfortable in your company, and if it helps Gareth to open up as well trying to help her then that's two birds with one stone in my opinion."

"So what do you want me to do Duncan?" I asked sitting down on a small piece of broken masonry. The big black hound padded up to me and put his face in my lap, I had been surprised when the dog had taken a shine to me, I only wished that his master would do the same eventually given time.

"You will take Drey and move about the camp looking for the Junior Grey Warden Alistair, I would like the two of you to meet as soon as possible, then spend some time getting to know each other, it will be an enlightening look into how the order works if nothing else and he can answer any questions you might have as long as they don't pertain to the joining ritual itself.

"All right" I stood dusting off my long black coat, seriously the best thing I'd ever owned except for maybe the staff, over the course of the journey I'd found that the clothes possessed many small but useful enchantments, the most useful being an enchantment which like the staff seemed to generate just the right level of comfortable heat, I hadn't felt cold since we left the tower. It also repelled water like the plague, which was a surprise find during a rainstorm that had hit the day after we started on the road with Nessa. "Find Alistair and get to know him, anything I should know?"

"Nothing he can't tell you himself, though I find that you two are very similar in personality, it shouldn't be too hard to get on good terms with him, also do try not to get noticed by any Templars," Duncan took a small flattened metal disc emblazoned with the grey warden insignia on its front, they will have to respect your Grey Warden status but don't flaunt that you are a mage, if their trouble flash this and make a scene, and any fellow grey warden in the area will help you."

With that the man began to walk towards a small encampment with the griffon banner of the order flapping in the breeze.

"I guess you're with me boy, let's find this Alistair."

As I made my way through the forest of tents I realized just how lost I was. I'd gotten conflicting directions from a few soldiers saying that the warden was running messages all over the camp as a liaison. I tried follow the signs posted at random intervals but even with that I'd found myself being lifted by the neck by an Ash Warrior even bigger than Gareth with twice as much muscle after I'd stumbled into one of their dog pens. As if he needed help looking intimidating, the man was flanked by two snarling mabari hounds coated in a strange painted substance the man called Kaddis. He had accused me of trying to sabotage the dogs and was about to introduce my neck to the blade of a particularly vicious looking axe when Drey waddled in. At the sight of the dog the man had dropped me and apologized, he'd even given me a small jar of Kaddis for Drey to use and sent me on my way.

By no fault of my own I'd somehow found my way to the mage encampment, seeing the flashes and flares as mages worked magic within its borders. It was very similar to the circle, even down to the helmeted, heavy plated Templars standing guard at every point in the camp. They gave me and my staff some sideways glances but I merely flashed my badge at them with a grin on my face, what was the purpose of being a grey warden if I couldn't get some enjoyment out of it. "William Amell, what in the name of Andraste are you doing here?!" a stern voice rang out over my shoulder, I turned around to find an elderly women stalking towards me, "Oh shit"

"Language, young man, language" The woman snapped grabbing my ear and dragging me into an open tent, unfortunately I was still able to hear the snickers of the Templars as I was dragged off by the old woman. As soon as we entered the tent she forced me to sit in a wicker chair before releasing my ear, Drey entered the tent growling but one look from her made him run behind me and lay down paws over his face and tail between his legs.

"Hello to you too Wynne, owww!" I growled rubbing my now very sore ear and reaching down to comfort the terrified dog. An ash warrior twice my size with an axe and he doesn't even flinch but then Wynne shows up with nothing but look and suddenly he's a wreck, yeah I could believe it.

"What are you doing here William, answer my question, whose dog is that, and what might I ask is this." The woman said sternly reaching into my coat pocket and pulling out the badge, hands now on her hips glaring down at me. This woman was considered by many to be the most gifted mage of her time, she was a respected senior enchanter and a stolid supported of the circle, many believed she would succeed Irving soon as First Enchanter, she had also taken on the role of grandparent while I was at the circle and the one who had introduced me to Irving and Rayya. Many of my early memories at the circle were spent in her study giving me lessons in controlling my powers and teaching me the magnitude of my gifts.

"Wynne it's a long story, but I'm here as a grey warden recruit, a lot of things have changed"

"Obviously" she gave a short sigh before a grandmotherly smile I'd grown up seeing spreading on her face "Well you have time, explain it"

The next half hour was spent relaying the events of the last few days, Wynne merely sat in silence listening attentively, though she did seem distressed when I told her about Jowan. "That poor stupid boy, blood magic" she said quietly shaking her head. "And this mess he's gotten you involved with, the wardens, it could have been worse I suppose."

"Yes Wynne I need to search for Alistair the grey warden, do you know where he is?" A look of surprise crossed her face.

"Alistair, yes I do suppose you would need to meet with him wouldn't you, he's a good man, I saw him moving delivering a message from the revered mother to Senior Enchanter Maurice in the ruin overlooking this site" A small smile appeared on her face, "Judging from the man's temperament it is very likely their still together"

"All right I guess I should go find them then. We can speak more after the battle; it would be nice to talk again when we have more time"

"Alright William, after the battle, be safe, and remember to eat enough" She put her hands on my shoulders, "You've grown so much in such a short time, I can hardly recognize you, by the way where did that staff come from." She said with a note of concern taking her hands off and looking at the runed staff slung over my shoulder by a thin hide strap.

"Oh this, First Enchanter Irving and Enchanter Sweeny got it for me, the clothes too."

"Hmmm, did they happen to mention the many dangers associated with determining magical resonance in custom made artifacts and tools?" I merely lifted my arms in a small shrug and smiled at her "They mentioned that I probably should have caught fire or something but don't scold them for it, they were very sure that I would be ok"

"Be safe William, and good luck." The women said sitting down in her chair and pulling out a large book.

"I will Wynne" I paused before pushing my way out into the afternoon sun, "Thanks for everything; I wouldn't be half the mage or the man I would be without you."

It felt good seeing Wynne, and I now had a rough idea of where I was going. As I made my way up the stair I saw a large man, shorter then Gareth but more muscular in splintmail arguing with a dark skinned mage who could only have been Maurice. The warden seemed to be joking around with the mage, much to his chagrin. Soon the mage stormed past me swearing under his breath about meeting with the Revered mother and adding in some colorful descriptors at that. Alistair walked up with a grin on his face.

"You know, One good thing about the blight is that it brings people together."

It was such a strange statement I couldn't help but laugh. "I know exactly what you mean; nothing else seems to generate the same kind of unified response does it."

"It's all like a big party, we can all stand in a circle and hold hands, that would give the darkspawn something to think about." I gave him a grin of my own, I liked this man I could see what Duncan was talking about, however I didn't get why it was so important to meet with him. Alistair suddenly looked at me closely "Wait we haven't met before have we? I don't suppose you would be another mage would you?"

Okay strange question but alright "Yes, I am, that a problem or something?"

"No, No" Alistair suddenly was waving his arms in front of him shaking his head, "It's just I can see why Duncan wanted us to get off on the right foot now so things wouldn't be awkward, he's told you about my past affiliation right?"

"No he didn't, why, does it matter?"

"It might, thing is some mages, like that grumpy fellow would be hesitant to work with a former Templar recruit"

"Oh…uh" Note to self, have serious talk with Duncan concerning information I needed to know. "Well that explains a lot"

"I hope it's not too much of an issue, I was not a Templar recruit by choice and never took my vows, I have never hunted a mage and quite honestly don't care for the Chantry very much."

"All right then I guess lets reintroduce ourselves, I'm William Amell former mage of the circle and Warden recruit" I held out my hand for him to shake "and before you ask no I'm not a blood mage, and as long as you agree not to watch me like a hawk or anything to templary, I won't go all abomination killing machine, agreed" He paused for a bit a surprised look before a wide grin spread across his face, "Agreed" he said clasping my hand.

Things were looking up, I had dodged a beheading, met up with Wynne, and even made a friend in the wardens, a former Templar to boot, this day was looking up, as I looked out at the rest of the camp I only hoped I would manage the same with my fellow recruits, Nessa would be a struggle and Gareth perhaps more so, but hey, I could hope.

-END

A/N: This was a long chapter, but to be honest this is probably the length I'm going to work towards in the future, I got a lot more of plot done and it wasn't too much trouble. Next chapter we see Ostagar from Nessa and Gareth's point of view, and then it's into the wilds where darkspawn killing action abounds. Thank you all for reading and commenting, the support is very welcome encouragement, also to answer a question, I am planning to introduce some of the other origins in the story, but from the viewpoint


	5. Chapter 5

INTO THE WILDS

**-Gareth Cousland-**

"Duncan said stay close and don't wander off elf!" I snarled pulling the Dalish woman along, her wrist in an iron grip. Damn you Duncan, leaving me stuck with watching the antisocial elf making sure she doesn't do something we'll all regret. Since leaving Duncan a half hour ago the elf had ditched me on multiple occasions, I had already stopped her from breaking the arm of a man who offered to sell her some old jewelry and had made the mistake of grabbing her shoulder when she tried to walk away and ignore him, not to mention my current situation, dragging her away from the two drunks lying unconscious on the ground surrounded by broken glass and loose vomit.

"They started it Noble, they grabbed me as I was walking and pulled me onto his lap, I was defending myself!" She said struggling in my grip and forcing me to stop. "Or should I just let men grope me whenever they take a fancy to the vulnerable elf girl or better yet try to talk to them which we both know wouldn't have done any good in the long run, it's their own fault!"

"No, to be honest I prefer what you did, the bastards deserved it, however it could have been avoided if you would just stick close to me and let me talk to them." I said looking down at her "I respect that you can handle yourself, you've more than proved that but honestly I find intimidating size more useful for situations like these.

"Fine, I promise I won't wander off again, at least let go of my arm, NOW!"

"Alright, since you promise, I guess I'll trust you" I released her arm which she immediately jerked back to her side; she stood there glaring up at me. "So where do we go Noble?"

"Duncan recommended I get my armor refitted and repaired at the kings forge so that's where we go, then we search for the two grey warden recruits." I began walking in the direction the soldier at the end of the bridge entering the camp had pointed out to me before I'd had to run off to find the elf, I could hear her light gait following close behind me, she keeps her promises, who fuckin knew. "And stop calling me that!"

"What, would you prefer the elf to call you my lord or some other title, oh wait I'm sorry I'm supposed to be a common elf" She took on a slurred uneducated accent, "I'm so sorry m'lord is this better, should I carry your supplies for you so your noble shoulders don't carry the burdens of us lesser beings."

"Stuff it elf," I spun around angrily fists clenched vision going red, in the back of my head I couldn't understand why this was so infuriating, I never used to get this angry, especially not at a few barbs. The young woman stiffened but continued to stare back at me defiantly.

"Why should I, that's how humans see us right, you nobles worst of all, I bet before all this you had all sorts of elves running around doing every little thing for you because it wasn't worth your refined attention." I wanted to shout back at her, but closed my eyes tight and forced my face into my palm and breathed slowly in and out, forcing myself to calm down, ever since that time with the knight I'd found it difficult to manage my temper at the best of times, now though this girl was just grating me. Taking a final deep breath I opened my eyes and met her gaze calmly, "For your information I didn't have servants attending my every need, my mother had seen what that did to other noble children and made sure I could do my own chores and look after myself."

"But surely you must have had servants" the elf countered, "Those who you put beneath you."

"Yes of course every castle and lord does and my father made sure many of those servants were elven…" Seeing a retort coming I swiftly moved to head it off "and no it wasn't because he liked it or enjoyed putting them down, unlike you Dalish who get to live "free, frolicking in the woods" most elves live in districts known as alienages, in many cities their viewed as little more than criminals with many struggling to survive" when she looked about to argue, I just continued on, fully committed now. "My father saw the states that other cities alienages fell into and resolved that his people, elf or human live without poverty, so yes when he was filling his staff, jobs that most nobles would give to humans, my father gave to elves so they would have enough coin to live on and that crime wouldn't be a tempting option. Many of those were friends of mine I'd known since childhood who fell when my house did, so no I don't see elves as servant's or being in any way beneath me so no you will not call me my lord or any other play on the word, We. Are. Equals" I stressed the words. "And as such you can call me Gareth, or Cousland, I don't care but don't treat me differently for something I was born into, I always hated that.

I turned around and kept on walking leaving an awkward silence in my wake which the elf finally broke as we neared the forge. "I am…sorry Gareth, perhaps I shouldn't have judged you or your family based on the stereotypes your people portray, forgive me."

I looked at her over my shoulder surprised, his was the first time the girl had used my name in the days she had been traveling with us, and I supposed it was a nice change. "Your forgiven, don't worry I'm pretty sure my family was one of the rare exceptions, most nobles are probably just as shitty to your people as you think they are but thank you for the vote of confidence Nessa, it means a lot." I didn't know why but I wasn't lying, her approval did make my feel a bit better.

"Still it's nice to know that some exceptions exist, I suppose." She said bowing her head.

I just nodded and started haggling over the cost of the refitting with the smith, my armor was covered in nicks and dents and it would take most of the day for the armorer to work on it, even with the help of his apprentices, the camps demands were just too high, he did say he could move me up the schedule for a small fee which I found unsurprising. I agreed to pay and removed my armor leaving me in my leather breeches and a loose cotton shirt with the strap holding my sheathed sword on my back slung across my chest, and allowed him to take my measurements with a measure.

As I walked out the elf merely gave me an appraising look and smirked, "The armor made you look bigger shem, not nearly as scary now."

"I'm still a head and shoulders taller then you, elf," surprisingly I found myself grinning back, "and believe me the view is nice." I put my hand out to compare the difference. "Anyway why are you looking so smug?"

"I found a grey warden recruit, a thief named Daveth."

"Really, and where is he? Why didn't he stick around to meet me?"

"He would have liked to probably, but I found some things he was saying and implying about me and him unsavory, if he found himself in need of some medical attention afterwards as a result well…" She shrugged her arms. All I could do was stare and sigh, I really can't leave you alone for 5 minutes can I, well we still have one more that I would like to meet with you in any case, plus we have most of the day to wait before Duncan expects us back and I get my armor. I looked off in across the field and saw the royal kennels. "I'd like to see about getting some food for Drey if you'd like to come with me."

"Oh I have a choice now; I thought you made me promise to stay near you. Very well I suppose I have nothing better to do with my time and I'd rather not walk around a camp of humans alone." she replied.

As we moved toward the fences, I saw her looking nervously at the hounds. "You know Mabari are different from most dogs, you don't need to be so scared of them, especially if they just want to say hello."

"I'm not scared of dogs, I just don't like them," She turned to me but I could still see her glancing at the fence. "When I was a child, a small village used dogs to chase my clan out of their marketplace, all I was doing was playing with friends when suddenly I'm being driven up a tree by a snarling hound with a bad bite on my wrist" she moved her bracer down showing off a few teeth mark scars. "Tamlen ended up saving me, he had always been a popular child in the clan and I was just the orphan result of an ill-fated bond, people looked down on my parents' marriage, I never really knew why, parents didn't want their kids near me. But despite this after he saved me he began spending time with me, asking me if I wanted to play with the other kids, making sure I was all right.

Suddenly a small sniffling sound caused me to turn around from petting the dogs; the small elf was crouched at the fence shaking, nails digging into the wood. "I miss him… I miss him so much." Well just my luck, we manage to get on somewhat friendly terms when I dredge up painful memories, "Well do something ass" a small voice played in my head, "this is your fault". Crouching next to her I brought my hand up and hesitated a bit, remembering what she did to those drunks, before putting it on her shoulder.

"I'm sorry, he must have meant a lot to you" I said somewhat awkwardly, Fergus had always been better at helping with people's personal issues, he would know what to do in this situation, and he wouldn't be messing up like I was right now. "If you want to talk, I'm here to listen" I said finally as I sat down on the ground next to her crouched form, leaning against the fence.

"No, I'm fine, it's unworthy to ask this of you, I mean, you have also lost much recently." She said looking at me with a small smile. I just leaned back on the fencepost and shrugged, "It's not unworthy to look for aid, and my situation probably just means I'm uniquely qualified to understand what you're going through."

She just looked at me before twisting around and sitting next to me on the post, "You know, the first time I saw you I was terrified, not just because you were bigger than me, not because your human though that didn't help, you had this look about you, your eyes were just cold, no warmth, no signs of life." She shivered a little before continuing. "Then inside the tent when Duncan grabbed me and you came in, the mage looked ready to soil himself when he saw what was happening but you, Fenarel is one of the best swordsmen in the clan, second probably only to Tamlen, and in full armor, you just had a sword but I could tell you'd win and he would die if you fought."

"I was scared, but looking at you now, your eyes are so much warmer, you laugh, you smile, you're actually not half as bad as I thought you would be, some noble bastard lording himself over others because he truly believes himself above them." She brought her knees to her chest and looked at the sky bushing her hair out of her face, "When I first heard the word noble from my hahren, or elder you would call him, I asked him how such people, pompous lords and ladies, could use such a word to describe themselves. He just laughed and called it one of humanity's many ironies, that such a positive word can be used to describe the some worst. I meant what I said though, as you are now, you might actually be able to live up to the title."

I just sat there staring at her, dumbstruck, how the hell did this happen, barely more than a word spoken before today and the girl was praising me. Words from years before began playing in my head, causing me to reach for the small silver leaf through my shirt, "I've been told that before, but I've never felt…hmm" we both turned as a small scratching and whining sound came from behind us. Looking back I saw that a small mabari with a white coat covered in black blotches was scraping the fence next to Nessa whining and growling.

"Sorry wardens" the kennel master came running up to us looking worried, he was holding a small muzzle. "The dog's owner died in the last battle and the dog consumed a good deal of darkspawn blood, I haven't been able to calm him"

I got up and was about to enter the pen when I saw the dog looking at Nessa expectantly. Being familiar with the concept of Mabari imprinting I saw the signs immediately, grabbing the muzzle from the man I held it out to the elf. "Nessa, you need to go in there, you're the only one who can calm it." The elf looked at me askance then at the dog looking terrified, so much for not being scared of dogs "No, no way, not going to happen!" I shook the muzzle insistently,

"Nessa you're the only one who can do this, it will rip anyone else apart but I think you actually have a shot." I tried giving her a reassuring smile "It will be okay, the dog won't hurt you, and it's in a lot of pain, it needs to be calmed so the man can help it" She looked unsure but after taking a deep breath she grabbed the muzzle and opened the gate "By the Creators, if I get eaten because of some shemlen". The dog retreated away from her slowly, keeping its eyes on her.

"All right that's good Nessa, be more confident and just put the muzzle on" I was thankful her back was turned so she couldn't see me reaching for my sword ready to charge the dog. If my guess was wrong, she would not be hurt by it. The elf paused and then was a flurry of motion swiftly muzzling the dog and reaching around to hold it steady, the dog calmed immediately and started nuzzling up to her.

The kennel master walked up next to me a look of disbelief on his face, "It imprinted, by the Maker what a relief, I've got to say wardens, you're all something else." As he moved to aid the dog and discuss some other ways to assist it with Nessa, I just looked on at the girl laughing with the dog cradled in her lap and sighed in relief, hand dropping from my sword.

**-Alistair-**

"So yeah, after a big tournament sponsored by the Chantry and the Templars to honor Duncan and the rest of the wardens, I ended up getting chosen to accompany them and have been with the order ever since" I finished, I'd spent the last few hours getting to know my new companion and his dog as we walked through the campsite, when Duncan mentioned in his note that a mage was among the recruits I'd been worried that my background might be an issue or at worst I might get turned into a toad for my trouble. I was happy to learn that this wouldn't be the case. After the initial awkwardness between us I found Will surprisingly easy to chat with, a mage with a sense of humor, who knew.

"So you won a tournament to get in the wardens" Will asked, face shining in admiration. "Compared to that, my story's not much better; all I've ever fought was a few magical sentinels"

"Won, hah!" I just broke laughing, stopping I had to lean down hands on my knees and catch my breath. Will just looked on confused. Wiping a tear from my eye I stood back up and put my hand behind my head. "Don't be so sure, I got my ass handed to me in the second round, turns out the chantry was fielding their best and I didn't get the note, I got hit so hard it took an hour and a hook to pry my helmet off" I shuddered at the memory, "Still don't like wearing the things even now"

"So if you didn't win, how did you end up in the wardens?" Will asked as we moved through a mess tent filled with men shouting, singing and drinking, I hoped had Duncan got something to eat that cheese the first night was fantastic. "Well after I'd gotten cleaned up and had the helmet removed, I was made to stand with the other recruits while Duncan stood with the Grand Cleric congratulating the victors. I tuned out most of it until I found myself getting pushed forward up to the stands, me just standing there face bruised while Duncan stood over me. Then he said that I was who he picked, liked my determination or so he said. That got some of the other knights mad and the Grand Cleric was spitting venom." I could still remember the chaos of his announcement, the shouting the sound of chairs clattering as their occupants stood up. "Duncan was forced to conscript me in order to get me out of there."

We just walked in silence after with the dog, Drey I think his name was, padding along next to us until we saw the Grey Warden encampment in the fading light, "Duncan's a good man isn't he?" Will suddenly spoke up, I turned my head to look at him. "He saved me from the sword, saved you from the chantry, he didn't have too, but he did, I just hope I live up to it." I put my arm around the man as we kept walking, "You'll do fine Will, If what you've told me of your background is true you'll do great, now let's get something to eat, we've got a big day tomorrow and Duncan will still needs to fill you in on some details."

After a short meal spent explaining some of the orders responsibilities, I brought Will out to a small campfire near the outskirts of the camp where Duncan stood talking with two warden mages, likely over some final details with the joining, it had been a long time since we had tested so many recruits at once. As he caught sight of me and Will approaching he waved the mages away and came to greet us a look of sharp relief on his grizzled face.

"Ah, Will, it's good to see you managed to find Alistair without much trouble, I trust there won't be any problems between you two?"

Will's face broke into a big smile as he patted me on the back, "Nothing to worry about Duncan, Alistair and I had a talk and worked out a good system for keeping things civil" He glanced at me and I made a show of agreement nodding my head.

"Yeah, nothing to worry about, still you should have told him before we met, it was kind of awkward hit or miss for a while there."

The old man had the grace to look a little sheepish when he responded "I wanted to be sure there would be no preconceived ideas made before you met, I apologize" He motioned for Will to sit down at one of the logs near the fire and for me to stand next to him. "We are merely waiting for the other recruits now, they should be here shortly."

True to his word, Daveth, who had somehow landed himself a black eye, and Ser Jory soon arrived followed shortly by a young elf girl with tattoos accompanying a large man in scaled armor, who must have been Nessa and Gareth. Drey bounded from inside the camp and started nipping at the man's heels. Gareth started scratching his head, the dog looked at the elf as well head cocked, and she looked at the man who just shrugged, before moving to do the same, the dog barking happily. Judging from the looks of surprise playing across Duncan's and Will's faces this was a new thing. I noticed Daveth looking at the girl nervously, and took a guess at the cause of thief's new injury.

Recovering from his surprise quickly Duncan stepped forward and began his explanation into tomorrow's events, the group took it well though Daveth looked nervous when Duncan mentioned that they would be going into the wilds themselves though I remembered that the man had grown up around this area before moving to Denerim so he had probably heard some of the horror stories surrounding the place.

"So let me get this straight…" Gareth spoke up as Duncan finished his explanation, "all we need to do is go into the wilds, find some darkspawn, get their blood, and find these treaties correct?"

Duncan nodded "Yes, Alistair here as the most junior warden will accompany you on your trek through the wilds and will assist you, but he is there mainly to ascertain your skills and guide you in my place" he paused, pointing me out to everyone, I just stood there and tried to look official. "Your primary task is getting the blood however, if you can't find the treaties or the way is too hazardous leaves them and come back, they aren't a necessary component to the joining, which…" he held up a hand when the elf looked ready to interrupt, "I will tell you about in detail when you make it back, forgive me but the ritual is a precious secret of the wardens and we must determine your worth" The girl closed her mouth and went back to sitting quietly.

Duncan clapped his hands together and looked around to the assembled recruits "That is all I have to say, Alistair will guide you to your tents where I suggest you get some sleep, you will need your strength for the days ahead." He then walked off towards another tent where some other veteran wardens stood pouring over a map of the valley.

**-Nessa Mahariel- **

"It's morning, Alistair wants you ready" a thickly accented voice announced as daylight spilled into the tent. I shook myself awake and moved groggily out of the comfortable cot to look at the speaker. Vera was an elven warden from Orlais who had joined up with the wardens two years previously, she was also the reason I was so tired, the woman had never worked with a Dalish in close proximity and she had pestered me all night about our customs and lifestyle making sleep almost impossible.

"All right I'll be just a minute" I said tersely, pulling the straps of my armor out of the saddlebag which Duncan must have brought with him when we arrived at the camp. I was happy to notice that the contents had not been rifled through though to be honest most of my belongings were personal with little value to anyone else. My elation faded as I saw that the bruised spots on my wrist had spread even farther then yesterday. The whispers had been growing louder as well ever since I had entered the camp, likely a side effect of being in such close proximity to the horde. I managed to tune it out and strapped on my bracer to hide the spread. As I tightened up the last strap on my armor I used a small tie to do my hair up in a loose tail down my back and out of my face. Fully dressed I moved onto my bow, carved from ironbark, it had served me well in my years hunting, checking to make sure the bowstring was dry and free of any damage I strung my bow in a single burst of motion. All that was left was to strap my mother's small hunting dagger to my thigh, I wasn't sure how useful it would be but felt it was better to be prepared, grabbing my cloak I exited the tent following Vera to a large gate where I noticed the others standing, Alistair, I saw, now had a set of fine steel and blue cloth plated armor emblazoned with the Griffon insignia of the order

Vera wished me luck and ran off to join some other wardens readying for a patrol. I moved to stand next to Gareth and the others.

"Where's Drey?" I asked him noticing the hound wasn't near his master. Ever since the matter at the kennels had been resolved I found myself strangely okay with the dog's presence. The kennel master had told me that the dog I had calmed had imprinted on me, while I could not say for certain if I even wanted a dog, it did look cute laying there in my lap and before I knew it I had promised the man that if I went into the wilds I would look for a special flower he could use to make an antidote for the hound.

"I thought he could use a rest, seems something he _ate,_" he turned around giving the mage, who was standing a few feet away speaking with the blonde shem, a sharp glare, "didn't agree with him, so he will have to stay behind at the camp." The mage just put up his hands and shrugged, "Okay, Okay, no more feeding the dog any weird meat, he wanted them and I don't eat them" he made his way over to stand next us, "Besides in my defense, I'm the one who had to clean up dog puke and whatever else that was on my pack only, seriously, I've been meaning to discuss your dog's intelligence because it seemed too planned out to be a coincidence."

Honestly I didn't know what to think of this human, most of the mages I had met, Keeper Marethari, Merrill, and some others I had met growing up around clan gatherings, each of them seemed studious and wise, as if they could see more than most people. This mage took those notions and set them burning, admittedly I had never met a human mage, nor one who had grown up in one of their chantry's circles. I couldn't imagine what it must have been like growing up in a glorified cage, unable to leave because of what you are. Maybe the mage's overly social personality was his way of compensating?

Regardless, yesterday had proven that some humans seem to be decent company, some. I looked over to where Ser Jory stood talking to Alistair, the balding shem shot a glance back at me and sneered. We'd met up with the knight soon after the dog fiasco receiving a blessing from a chantry initiate. Gareth had introduced himself to the man while I told the mother that I had no wish to receive a blessing from a human god, getting called a heathen for my trouble.

Jory had been pleasant enough talking to Gareth once he heard his last name, bowing to him, saying how honored he was to be in the presence of a noble of his station. I tried to ignore it but could see that Gareth was becoming very uncomfortable with the attention. I'd tried to shift some attention away from him by introducing myself, very politely; however the man just looked shocked and hastily excused himself, bowing one more time for good measure before slinking off muttering about elves joining the wardens, shaking his head.

I suddenly felt a hand on my shoulder and turned to see the mage giving me a stupid grin, "Jory was going off on you last night, saying how you won't be of any use to the order and what not, but hey, don't listen to him, the Dalish have always given of an impression as being excellent hunters and woodsmen, well" he fanned his arm out in the direction of the thick copse of trees beyond the gate, "here's the perfect place to show off". Before I could say anything in response he moved back to talk to Daveth animatedly.

"He's right you know" Gareth's deep voice intoned, "Duncan wouldn't have brought you along unless he thought you would be able to help us." I could feel my face reddening and looked away, "I…I doubt I'll be very useful, I've only ever hunted prey before, never a straight up fight." Before either of us could continue the conversation, Alistair raised his hand and announced we were entering the wilds following a small scouting party.

The next hour was spent with me somehow leading the group through the forest with the warriors spread to the sides with the thief and the mage bringing up the rear. Gareth must have informed the Grey Warden of my skills as he seemed to have no objection to any of my sudden stops and detours as I tried to determine the party's course. Soon enough however we came upon the smoking remains of the party's cart as well as many mutilated corpse propped up in strange positions. I saw with no small level of disgust that many of the bodies had teeth marks near missing limbs. I turned around at a sudden clamor of noise behind me but relaxed when I saw it was only the mage stumbling forward, proceeding to empty his stomach. To be honest, even years of hunting and skinning kills had barely prepared me for this brutality. Bringing a hand to my belt I walked over to the now dry heaving mage who stood up wiping his mouth.

"I'm…I'm sorry, it's just I…" His face paled as he looked around him once more. "It's fine, perfectly natural, here." I offered him a small herb from my belt pouch. "Chew this to calm your stomach." The mage accepted the herb gratefully and shoved it in his mouth. "Thank you Nessa, really" I simply nodded at him and moved to Alistair who was surveying the carnage with a sad look on his face.

"Spread out, search for any survivors or sign of where the darkspawn went." Alistair's voice rang out clearly in the in the now silent clearing.

"Over here!" Daveth shouted moving aside a blackened piece of timber to reveal a bloody and wide eyed man in shredded armor, he was clutching his side which hosted a serious wound but held no other signs of injury.

"Who are you? Grey Wardens?" The man muttered in a raspy voice, seeing the Griffon insignia on Alistair's chest plate.

"Hmm the man's not as he looks is he." Alistair said dryly crouching down over the man, I glared at him, this was no place for such dark humor.

"Darkspawn, came out of the ground, caught us by surprise, and slaughtered everyone, carried off a few." The man shuddered out, then falling into a coughing fit leaving flecks of blood on Alistair's armor and looked up with pleading eyes. "Please, I need to get back to camp."

"Let's get him some bandages at least" the mage crouched quickly pulling some poultices out of his pack, he then shoved his hand into the man's side, "Okay now breath slowly this will feel strange and might hurt for a while" His hands started glowing, causing the man to shudder slightly and moan.

Alistair called the rest of us together, before he could say a word however Jory suddenly pushed past me and stood in Alistair's face, "Did you hear that, an entire patrol wiped out by darkspawn, how many could we face, a dozen a hundred there's an army out there, I'm no coward, but continuing on is foolish we should go back." I couldn't believe this shem, "Sound like a coward to me" I said to no one in particular. Daveth laughed while Jory spun around fists clenched, I tensed up ready to defend myself. "Quiet Elf!" Gareth stepped between us and looked down at the man while Alistair grabbed Jory's shoulder.

"Enough" Alistair shouted, he looked to me then back at the shaking knight, "Ser Jory I realize your concerns but don't worry, every grey warden can sense darkspawn, it's part of the reason I'm here. There darkspawn in these woods but I promise they will not take us by surprise."

"You hear that Ser knight," Daveth stated casually "We might die, but we'll be warned about it first." The knight just looked down and grimaced "That's reassuring"

The mage helped the injured man to his feet, the wound looking substantially better, "All right we're ready move, this man says he can reach the camp alone from here."

"Good job Will" Alistair turned to the rest of us. "All right we're moving out, I can sense Darkspawn nearby so be prepared for anything." As we continued on I could still feel Jory's eyes on my back, I briefly considered turning around to settle our argument when a shrill cry broke the air, and the world instantly turned to hell.

-End

A/N: Thank you everyone for the reviews and feedback so far, the next one will definitely take a bit longer, semester starting and all, things are heating up and I like writing fights.


	6. Chapter 6

BATTLES FOUGHT

**-Gareth Cousland-**

It was shocking really, one minute we're walking in a tight group through the heavy undergrowth, dredging through muck, shit, and who knows what else. Then the next I see Nessa and Alistair stiffen and raise their hands to their heads, we only had a seconds warning when an inhuman cry split the afternoon air. The fog was heavy up ahead but I could make out a large hill with shapes moving on top of it. Then I hear movement off to the side, turning I'm greeted with the sight of a small group of Darkspawn.

Having never seen a Darkspawn before, I really hadn't known what to expect when I faced one in combat, I'd seen some bodies back at the camp but those didn't even compare to the monsters in front of me. I'd faced men, elves; even the odd dwarf in tournaments and during patrols rooting out bandits, but these _things,_ some things just shouldn't exist. The one running at me now was a pale skinned Hurlock, a breed of darkspawn roughly the size of a large human, so my size, in a set mismatched pieces of armor made from a mix of scale like appendages and scavenged plate wielding a twisted looking hatchet. The Hurlock was charging at me, screaming, the flesh at the mouth so tight that its teeth showed in a fanged smile, its eyes pale and dead looking. I drew my sword from the sheath on my back, fighting down the urge to run that was building in my gut, similar sounds of alarm and preparation came from behind me as I sprinted forward.

As I closed the distance the creature gave a cry of glee bringing the axe blade straight for my head. Stepping quickly to the side I parried the axe blade away with my sword and in the same motion slammed the creature with the face of my shield, as the creature stumbled back from the blow, I brought my sword down through its shoulder and deep into its chest. Kicking the creature back to free my sword, I took a quick breath. I heard movement to the side and ducked as another Hurlock this one wielding a curved sword took a sidelong sweep at me. Dodging the blade, I moved behind the now wide open darkspawn and hamstrung its legs with one clean swipe and put my sword through its neck as it fell to his knees and twisted. I was correct, it was harder to control my temper now, the break that had occurred when Howe's knight wounded Drey still lingered, but I could control it. Looking back I could see just how my companions were doing.

Jory and Daveth seemed to be holding their own, Daveth firing off arrows at some stunted genlocks, small bulky darkspawn, who were coming down the hill, and Jory swinging his big sword holding off two hurlocks. Alistair was holding off a large darkspawn carrying a war hammer, defending Will, who was nursing an arrow wound in his thigh. Nessa, was standing off from the group, looking further I could see four darkspawn taken by well-placed arrows to the head or heart. Ser Jory cut through the last of his attackers just as I made out a small shape making its way behind the elf. Jory saw it too but instead moved to finish off the creatures Daveth had shot at the hill, fucking bastard, I began charging forward but I knew I wouldn't make it in time. "Nessa! Behind you!" She turned just in time to see the genlock rogue leap at her, knife drawn. Suddenly a bolt of fire hit the would be assassin in the side, blowing it apart, I looked to see Will, hand raised, sweating and in obvious pain, but grinning at his shot. As we made sure the last of the darkspawn were down and unmoving I moved to Will who was being supported by Alistair, the warden was feeling at his side but seemed all right, we all did, with the exception of Will's injury.

"Ah, owww, that hurts ah" the mage grunted as Alistair placed him on a fallen tree trunk. "His face fell as he saw me approaching, "I'm sorry Gareth, Alistair, I froze up, I just couldn't move and then" He motioned to his leg.

Alistair clapped him on the shoulder sympathetically, "Hey don't worry yourself over it, everyone feels afraid when they first meet a darkspawn, I had nightmares for a week after my first." remembering the feeling I'd had earlier as the Hurlock charged me I nodded my head.

"Plus this was your first life or death battle, it's alright to be afraid, it happens to all of us, besides you saved Nessa with that spell." I looked at the elf and saw that she was watching me strangely.

The mage smiled at my words and looked down at his wound grimacing in pain. "Yeah, I suppose, maker damn it that doesn't look too bad, not too deep, I could heal it I think, so when you say all of us does that mean you as well?" Taken aback by the sudden question I paused and gazed at Alistair for a moment, I then crouched down to Will's side grabbing his wrist.

"Remind me to tell you about it later, and sorry, I really am, I know this part hurts a lot" the mage looked at me, confused, when Alistair grabbed his other wrist. At that same moment I grabbed the shaft and yanked hard.

An hour later we were moving further into the forest's heart each of us carrying a vial of darkspawn blood, following Alistair's vague assumption of where the tower was, the man was a decent leader but definitely needed work on his confidence. The man was now standing at the head of the group followed closely by Daveth who was helping along a sober looking Will. The mage had surprised us all managing to heal his wound with only moderate difficulty and time leaving little more than a small scar, he wouldn't be fit to put too much strain on the limb for another day or so but he said he would be fine to continue on. I glared at Jory who was following close behind, I had confronted the man about his reaction to Nessa's attacker while everyone was focused on Will, the man had claimed he hadn't seen the rogue, bullshit. Meanwhile Nessa was walking closely beside me bringing up the rear of our motley group, we had met only a few other enemies, including an emissary, a sort of darkspawn mage, but with help from Alistair's Templar abilities suppressing the mage's spells and a fair amount of warning we dealt with them with little difficulty.

"Where'd you learn how to fight Gareth?" Nessa asked suddenly turning her head to look at me.

"Excuse me?"

"Who taught you how to fight like that; you don't have the same rigid style as that the blond shem does. It's similar, but you fight like Tamlen did, at least with your footwork and this sort of fluidity you have with your strikes. So where did you learn how to fight"

I shrugged as we navigated through a particularly thick growth of trees; I had heavier armor so I pushed my way to make a path for her. "Well I spent many years at it, I didn't just learn all of it at once. I took what I could over time from many different people, arms masters, trainers and the like. What has served me best however was from one of my best friends Matthis. His mother was a Dalish who had left her clan to marry an elf from one of the Alienages. She was teaching him how to fight and he in turn taught me, I just adapted it to my own style."

"Your best friend was an elf?" She asked a look of genuine surprise on her face.

I laughed as memories started playing in his head. "Yes, his family had been hired by my father when I was eight and my father let their children play around the castle while they worked. He was the only one who didn't just agree with me or bow to me like every other kid I knew. We fought a few times in the yards outside the castle but after I helped him out when he ran afoul of some visiting noble's sons who thought they would have some fun reprimanding the uppity elf and afterwards he became a second brother. He and his twin sister Sara were some of the best friends I had growing up and as we got older my father paid him to help me train." To be quite honest we had raised our fair share of hell together as children as well, those were fun times, but soon I felt my face darken.

She noted the change of expression, "I'm sorry, they were among the fallen when your home was attacked?" I just put on a sad smile and shook my head.

"No, when I was eighteen, their mother had finally had enough of her children associating with a human highlord's son and moved the whole family to the Denerim alienage, I sent letters but it's been years since I got anything back."

"Oh, my apologies for bringing up such sad memories"

"No, No, it's quite alright. Sometimes it's good to just remember happier times" she just nodded and we continued in silence until we reached a large hill with the remains of a broken tower standing at its peak. Alistair held up his hand, face tense with concentration. "I can sense maybe a dozen or so darkspawn, one potentially an alpha."

**-William Amell-**

"What do you mean alpha?" I asked, concerned at the look on Alistair's face.

Instead of Alistair answering, Gareth's voice spoke out from behind me, "I heard some soldiers talking about them, they are the field commanders, the biggest and most blood thirsty of the horde." Alistair merely nodded at the statement.

"They are also the most intelligent of their kind, equipped with the best armor and weapons." He amended quietly "If the treaties are still intact, they'll most likely be there, how we get to them will pose a challenge."

As he and Gareth moved to discuss a suitable strategy for taking the hill, I took the opportunity to sit myself down on a large moss covered rock sighing in relief. Since I healed my leg, most of the pain had receded to a dull but insistent ache though I still had trouble moving it very much, Wynne had always expressed how difficult it was to heal yourself, I could only hope I had avoided doing something wrong and crippled myself. "Stupid Alistair, Stupid Gareth, stupid darkspawn" I found myself muttering under my breath, I realized it had to be done and it was probably better that they had done it by surprise but healing yourself after getting an arrow ripped out of your thigh still hurts like a bitch.

Considering it had been the first time I'd ever aimed fireballs at a living thing, I thought the day had gone quite well after the first fight, we'd progressed quickly through the wilds, Nessa had picked up a strange plant along the road but stayed quiet as to what she needed it for, and I had found a small lock box belonging to a missionary and his son whose bodies we had found along the path which was now sitting in my pack. A note along the bottom said to return the box to Jetta of Redcliffe. I had idea if I'd ever head over there any time soon but I thought it better to take it with me, then just leave it here to the horde.

"Will, how much mana do you have?" Alistair's voice broke my train of thought

Looking down I made a short check of my belt before closing my eyes, feeling out my power. "I have a bit left in me, I have a small vial of lyrium left but beyond a few small spells I won't be able to do much." Alistair only nodded and stood up.

"Alright Nessa, Daveth you will take position on that ridge, he pointed towards a small outcropping that gave a good view of the grounds outside the tower, Will I want you with them as well, you will be assaulting the main bulk of the enemies from a distance." Looking at me he continued on with his briefing "Will don't waste spellpower if you don't have it, I don't sense any emissaries so your focus will be to hang back and provide aid if this doesn't go well." I merely nodded my head in assent.

"While you're doing this, Ser Jory, Gareth and myself will charge up the hill, to engage the survivors of the ranged assault and deal with the alpha, don't bother wasting arrows on it, they're usually armored head to toe in thick plate, nothing short of a crossbow will prierce that, just keep the bulk of the spawn distracted."

(30 minutes later)

All in all the plan was pretty solid, I'd fired off a small magical flare, nonlethal but it got the darkspawn's attention inside, and they'd come spilling out towards the three warriors making their way up the hill. Nessa and Daveth firing off arrows into their ranks with amazing speed and accuracy, dealt with the majority of the creatures leaving only a few to face the oncoming fighters. However as soon as a darkspawn a head taller in bulky armor and a horned helm strode out of the broken tower wielding a fine steel dwarven axe with a wicked spike in one hand and a strange ornate dagger in the other, things got more difficult. Jory was engaged in a fierce fight against a Hurlock and a small genlock, his sword spinning in long arcs, keeping them at a distance however with their moving around it was difficult to get a clear shot without risking hitting the panicked knight. This left Alistair and Gareth facing the alpha together.

The large darkspawn may have stood alone against the two but despite their best efforts it was holding its own, its weapons swinging to bat away every attempted assault the two made. I could see from here creature was brutally strong pushing the two back, suddenly after parrying Gareth's sword away with its dagger the beast swung its axe at Alistair who was trying to come in from the side. The ex Templar managed to bring up his shield to block the worst of the blow but the axe broke through the wooden shield, the alpha then delivered a brutal kick to Alistair's chest sending the man to the ground. The Hurlock advanced to finish him off, raising its weapons but a sudden blood curdling yell broke through the forest, Gareth ran at the Hurlock a mad glint in his eyes and began battering at the alpha with sword and shield both, overwhelming the Hurlock with the sheer strength of the blows, meanwhile Alistair was still on the ground coughing up blood trying to crawl his way to a sitting position.

"I'm heading down there!" I yelled back as I sprinted down the ridge towards the hill, Jory had killed his opponents but seemed hesitant to get between the mad noble and his opponent. "Jory, help me grab Alistair" I wasn't a weakling but even I knew I would need help lifting a man larger then myself in full plate, running to the injured man's side, Jory assisted in dragging the armored man along, when we sat him down I began healing him. I could tell he probably had some gotten some ribs cracked or broken from the force of that kick.

"By the Maker and his beloved Andraste he fights like a man possessed" Jory said dumbstruck face pale while looking over my shoulder, I turned around just in time to see a still screaming Gareth swing his sword into the side of the Hurlock neck, the enchanted blade cutting through the plate and biting into its neck, again and again he swung until the creatures head hung by a thin strip of sinew. Kicking the creature into the dirt Gareth then just stood there breathing heavily,

"Gareth!" I looked to see Nessa and Daveth running up the hill towards us, Gareth turned quickly and almost looked ready to charge us when he suddenly paused dropping his sword and grabbing his face in his now empty hand. He then just walked to a fallen log and sat down shaking. Nessa picked up his sword and made to go to him but I held up a hand stopping her with a shake of my head. "Don't, give him some time to cool off." She just looked down at the sword in her hands and sighed. "What the bloody hell was that?" Daveth whispered in my ear looking at the still sitting noble, "I don't know, we can ask him later right now just hold down Alistair I don't want him moving to much while I'm doing this." With that said I turned my attention back to healing the wounded Templar, after a few minutes I shakily stood up, the warden would have some trouble breathing for a while but by drinking the last of my lyrium vials I gained enough strength to heal his ribs as well as a small fracture on his shield arm.

Looking back I saw that Gareth had moved from his log back to the darkspawn's corpse, picking up up the creatures axe and examining it before putting it through a loop in his belt, it was a fine weapon, likely taken from some wealthy dwarven noble killed in the deep roads. He then walked past me to get his sword from Nessa.

I stopped him with my hand and he looked back at me stone faced, "You okay?" I asked, yeah great thing to say Will, he just looked to the side and pushed my hand away with a curt "I'm fine" for a response. The elf also tried to talk to him as he grabbed his sword but was similarly rebuffed. "Did he ever talk or say anything that explains what he just did?" I asked as I stepped up behind Nessa, who stood looking at Gareth's retreating back as he made for the fortress.

"He didn't say much in regards to his past, beyond the fact that he's a noble of a well-known lineage and that his family was recently murdered, I know very little of his life before the wardens." She said slowly, she seemed a little shaken but didn't have a scratch on her, though her skin did seem to have less color then when I had first met her. "When did you two become so friendly, I mean he seems comfortable talking to you and you to him?" I asked suddenly, the question had been sitting at the back of his mind since last night, "I mean, when I tried to talk you just told me to sod off." She just looked at me with small smirk.

"I said it more elegantly and in much greater detail of what you could go to" she raised her eyebrow, "I had also just been forced to forsake my clan in favor of a group of armed humans with only the barest shred of credibility, and filled with humans only hours previously. So perhaps maybe that wasn't the best time to approach me acting friendly."

I felt my cheeks warming up with embarrassment, "Your right, maybe I was a little hasty with the greetings, I just wanted you to be comfortable in the group, I know how it is, to leave everything you know."

She just shook her head, "That does seem to be the common denominator in our little group doesn't it, you leaving your circle, me leaving my clan, Gareth losing his family."

"You still haven't answered the first question."

"Gareth just showed me that not all humans are as my personal experiences have portrayed them, that there are exceptional ones among you. I would like to think that you and Duncan might fall under that category as well." I hated to think about what some of those personal experiences included. She then indicated the other three members of our group, Alistair getting up on his feet shakily, Daveth helping him up with a smile while Jory merely stood his face worried. "I may not like how he sees me but the thief might prove amenable, the grey warden as well, neither seem to judge me as much as the knight however."

"Ser Jory may not be the most accommodating individual, plus don't get him started on his wife, it's a nice story but he likes to ramble on, however I think all he needs is some time to adjust and he should be okay in the end"

"The shem needs more than time to help I think, anyway Gareth said he'd also had his fair share of elven friends growing up including an elf by the name of Matthis, they may not have been Dalish but any noble willing to associate with elves in any capacity other than kicking them down or ordering another cup of wine should be worth giving a chance to in my opinion."

"Did you say something about an elf named Matthis?" Daveth's voice suddenly rose up from behind, causing both of us to turn. The thief was looking at the two of us with a curious look on his face while crouched down over the alpha's corpse; he seemed to be examining the creature's knife. "Sorry, didn't mean to eavesdrop but couldn't help it, old habits." He gave us a guilty smile.

"Yeah that's what she said, you know him?"

The man just shrugged his shoulders "Not personally, don't even know if it's the same bloke, but I'd heard rumors from some "associates" of an elf operating out of the Denerim alienage by that name a short while before Duncan picked me up."

"Really you mean you heard this from some other criminals? What kinds of rumors?" Nessa asked with a look of interest on her face while I grabbed a canteen off my belt to take a sip of water, no way Gareth knew anyone Daveth might have heard about.

"Nothing too concrete, like I said this was right before I got recruited so I couldn't confirm anything, just stories of some elf rampaging through the Arl of Denerim's estate carving up hordes of guards and even killing the Arl's son before vanishing without a trace."

The swig went right down the wrong hole as I jerked my head around. "Really the arl's son and they didn't catch the man responsible?" I choked out, coughing up some water; Nessa thumped my back to help me along.

"Yep without a trace, the only reason I really checked into it at all was that it seems Duncan might have known the elf's family and was still recruiting." He said with a small laugh as I got under control. "Imagine that, serving with such a "famous" rogue within out ranks, Duncan was really interested, but we never turned up any trace of him and the other elves weren't keen on helping so we just moved on."

"Yeah imagine that, yeah I don't think it's the same elf, just a coincidental name," I took a long breath, yep no way dutiful, serious Gareth knew anyone who would go on any rampages, though after Gareth's little episode I wasn't completely so sure." Nessa just looked back in the direction of the fortress a thoughtful look on her face.

"Why did the elf do such a thing?" She asked finally.

"From what the elves told us, the Arl's son interrupted a wedding and kidnapped the brides and bridesmaids including the elf's bride and cousin. Next day the Arl's son is dead along with everyone involved and the women were returned." Daveth turned his attention back to the knife, "Not the best example of humanity, the women were roughed up and someone died I think, the bastard deserved what he got I think" he said nodding his head.

"Though would Duncan have risked taking in such a man, I mean the order isn't that powerful is it?" I stated. Daveth just shrugged again, "Think about me friend, known thief, if street scum like me can be taken for the wardens, a man who could fight his way through an Arl's complement of guards, slay his son, and get away like he never existed, Duncan was spitting hot irons for days after we left the city for missing the opportunity."

"The elf was in the right, it's about time the city elves produced one who stands for himself" Nessa said off hand, "Anyway, is the warden ready to search the ruins with us or are we on our own."

"I'm alright everyone lets rejoin Gareth" Alistair's voice rang out.

(1 hour later)

"Damn it!" I threw my arms up in exasperation then cringed when a fresh shot of pain hit my leg. "We've combed every inch of this place" We'd found a chest that according to Alistair was supposed to carry the treaties, it had been smashed open and was completely empty,

"If they aren't here, then let's go back to camp, we have the blood, we're done" Gareth's voice rang out through the empty corridors.

Once we were all back in what had once been the main hall, Alistair sighed and looked at the chest crestfallen, "Duncan had really been hoping to get his hands on those treaties, they would have made things much easier." I knelt by the chest one last time, the thing had been bothering me ever since we stumbled on it, the chest had been broken with magic, strong magic, it seemed to be drawing me in, I reached my hand towards it.

"Well, well, what do we have here?"

-End

**A/N: All right, out of the forest and I have to admit I liked writing the fight scenes. With schoolwork and social stuff piling up I am kinda bushed, I am hard at work however and your reviews and feedback helps, thanks for your support, you guys make this so much easier. The next chapter will be a little bit longer in the works definitely but it is coming. **


	7. Chapter 7

OSTAGAR FALLS

**-Nessa Mahariel-**

"_Join us, brothers and sisters. Join us in the shadows where we stand vigilant. Join us as we carry the duty that can not be forsworn. And should you perish, know that your sacrifice will not be forgotten. And that one day we shall join you._" Alistair finished the strange oath and stepped back allowing Duncan to take the strange silver chalice.

Why am I here? I thought to myself as Duncan called Daveth forward in a solemn voice, I should be with the clan, or out hunting or doing anything else, just not here.

(Hours earlier)

"Are you a vulture, I wonder, a scavenger poking amidst a corpse whose bones were long since cleaned?" The raven haired human woman spoke in an enchanting voice as she walked slowly down the stairwell, she was dressed in a peculiar fashion, leathers and animal skins with a top that left little to the imagination, she may have been one of the barbarian Chasind that had lived in the area. The staff she carried however marked her as a mage just the same, and that meant keeping an eye on her while my hand went towards my knife. "Or merely an intruder, coming into these darkspawn filled wilds of mine in search of easy prey?" the woman continued stopping at the foot of the stairs and looking at each of us in turn, I noticed with a start that her eyes were a shining yellow gold like an animals. "What say you, hmmm, scavenger or intruder?"

"We are neither, the Grey Wardens once owned this tower." Ser Jory spoke up from the back of the group.

"Tis a tower no longer, the wilds have obviously claimed this desiccated corpse." The woman began to pace towards us, "I have watched your progress for some time, where do they go I wonder, why are they here" She came to a stop next to an fallen section of wall overlooking the wilderness and turned back to face us. "And now you disturb ashes that none have touched in so long, why is that?"

"Don't answer her, she looks Chasind, and that means others are probably nearby" Alistairs voice whispered, "No shit Alistair" Gareth's responded under his breath as he scanned the upper ramparts his hand on his sword. I just kept my eyes on the woman, she seemed unafraid, even as she stood alone against six armed wardens, one of whom a mage. The human was confident if nothing else. "Oh, you fear barbarians will swoop down upon you" the woman taunted Alistair; I was surprised that she had heard his whispered comment. Alistair was visibly put off by this as well and glared at her, "Yes, swooping is bad," Gareth shut his eyes tightly while Will laughed under his breath, Alistair may have been a fine warrior but eloquence seemed lost on him.

"She's a witch of the wilds she is, she'll turn us into toads" Daveth stated suddenly, the man looked more terrified then I'd ever seen him, I remembered then that the man had grown up around this area meaning that this women was very likely the subject of his childhood nightmares.

"Witch of the wilds am I, such idle fancies those legends, have you no minds of your own" the woman remarked looking at the poor man, causing him to shrink back even more.

Her eyes suddenly alighted on Will and Gareth, the young mage slowly got to his feet, hand gripped tightly on his staff while the warrior grit his teeth and glared back at her. "You there, handsome men, tell me your names and I shall tell you mine."

"Damn witch" Gareth muttered under his breath but was pushed to the side by the mage who walked in front of him.

"You may call me William Amell, former mage of the circle of magi, emphasis on former," he gave her a small smirk, "and current grey warden recruit milady, a pleasure to meet you." he finished with a low flourishing bow. Even the woman seemed taken aback by the courtesy, unable to hide the incredulous look she gave the bowing mage; I couldn't believe the shem, flirting in a place and time like this with a woman like her.

"Now, that is a proper, civil greeting, you may call me Morrigan" she glanced at Gareth, all signs of surprise gone once again, "I didn't catch your name"

"Gareth Cousland" the woman looked at him as if expecting him to go into the same level of detail as the mage, but got nothing but a glare in response.

"Shall I guess your purpose then, wardens, you sought something in that chest, something that is here no longer."

"Here no longer" Alistair said stepping forward to stand beside Will pointing an accusatory finger at the woman, "You stole them didn't you, you're some kind of sneaky witch thief" in retrospect I thought it probably sounded a lot better in his head, if the Templar would only use it, Morrigan picked up on that quickly.

"How very eloquent, tell me, how does one steal from dead men hmmm?"

"Quite easily it seems, those documents are Grey Warden property and I suggest you return them." Finally some words of sense, the woman might be confident but even a powerful mage would have trouble facing six opponents alone.

A look of indignation crossed the woman's pretty features, "I will not for it was not I who removed them, invoke a name that means nothing here no longer if you wish; I am not threatened"

"Then who removed them" I spoke up from the back of the group.

"T'was my mother in fact." The woman said crossing her arms lazily.

"Can you take us to her?"

Her face lit up, "Now there is a sensible request. I like you" she spoke with a small laugh in her lips.

Alistair turned back to me with a concerned look on his face, "I'd be careful if I was you, first it's I like you," he tried to imitate the woman's voice, failing miserably, "and then zap, frog time."

"She'll put us all in a pot she will, just you watch" Daveth said, still with that shaky whimper. Jory just looked at him and sighed "Well if the pots any warmer than this forest it would be a nice change.

"Follow me, then if it pleases you." The woman said finally turning around and beginning her descent down the ridge.

"See, no one fights and we get our treaties." Will said with a bright look on his face, Gareth just walked behind and slapped him across the back of the head before heading after growling something about the mage being a love-struck idiot.

**-William Amell- **

(Hours Later)

Oh shit, oh shit, oh shit, oh shit, Maker preserve me,

It wasn't the most eloquent or polite of thoughts I'd ever had but to be fair I wasn't in such a good mindset at the moment. We'd made it back to the camp a little over an hour ago and met with Duncan where we each gave him our vials of blood as well as the treaties, who he quickly handed off to the elf warden Vera for safe keeping. My thoughts weren't much on the conversation at hand, I was still thinking about Morrigan, the enchanting witch. I had been in the tower for almost my entire life and have seen my fair share of beauties, Rayya had been a looker, I'd made a point to tell her, but Morrigan was on a whole different level. She had taken us to her mother's house, I still couldn't believe that, a house, not a hut or anything, a large house at that in the middle of the Kocari wilds.

Her mother turned out to be a very old woman, hair grayed and stooped with age, her mind however was sharp while she gave us cryptic answers to our many questions. She had given us the treaties, no problem or hassle, and merely told us to warn the wardens that the threat was greater than they realized, she then had Morrigan guide us back to the camp safely avoiding the horde.

I had tried to talk to the woman but she refused to speak more than a few passing words, as soon as we reached the camp she turned around and with a small smile bid farewell and began walking back into the forest. As the others moved toward the camp I turned around to get one last glimpse of her but All I saw behind me was a raven sitting in a low hanging tree, which cawed once before taking flight.

Duncan told us that we were to report to the ruins where I had met Alistair within the hour, that was all he told us before he and Alistair walked off, leaving us to our own devices, Gareth, Daveth, and Jory had moved towards the cook fire for some food, I moved with them intending to join them. Nessa just wandered off towards the kennels a small look of excitement on her face, strange, I thought she had hated dogs.

Now however everything just seemed wrong, we arrived at the ruins just as Duncan instructed. He and Alistair came shortly afterwards, Duncan carrying a small silver chalice with intricate designs scrolling the surface, it was at the same time both enchanting and terrifying. He then informed us we would be drinking the blood we had collected, it was about this time I started really getting chills, now though with Daveth lying dead in a puddle of vomit and blood on the ground and Jory crawling on the ground trying to hold his entrails in.

The man had attacked Duncan after seeing what drinking the cup did to Daveth, saying that he had a wife and would not do something so suicidal, to which Duncan responded with a hushed apology and a blade in the guts. Now he just stood there looking at me covered in Jory's blood a solemn look on his face, the message was clear, turn back or refuse to drink, and you die. I briefly contemplated firing off a quick spell but thought better of it, Alistair was looking right at me with a hard glint in his eye. He was here for me, if I made a move to hurt Duncan I would be drained of my power by the Templar's abilities and dispatched as easily as Jory. I couldn't blame Alistair though, from what he'd told me, Duncan was as good as a second father to him.

"Step forward William, from this point on you are a grey warden"

I just took a short breath and accepted the cup, staring down at the dark substance. "So let it be" I brought the cup to my lips, the taste was horrible and I had to do my best just to avoid spitting it out, the blood burned down my throat, I let out a last gasp and looked around handing the cup back to Duncan. "Huh, I feel fine" and then the pain began, with the last thing I remember is falling to my knees and grabbing my throat, seeing the looks of horror on Nessa and Gareth's faces, that and Mouse's manic laughing in the distant part of my mind.

**-Gareth Cousland-**

The pain was incredible, darkness surrounded me as I felt myself falling and lurching, screams, howls, and laughter all around me. In the distance I could just make out the form of a large dragon flying through the darkness releasing gouts of corrupted flame, its skin drawn tight and its eyes dead.

I had never been so frightened, suddenly there were dark figures all around me, screaming for my blood and the blood of others, and the song, the seductive but equally disturbing song. It would be a kindness, a privilege, no a blessing to just end it all, to just fade away. Then a sudden change in the laughter caught my attention, I knew who this was, no, NO, I would not die, I would not stop until the owner of that voice was a corpse, until all he was smashed and broken, not until his heart was in my hands. I roared out his name, I would not fall until my family had vengeance.

My eyes opened to an unfamiliar tent but the laughter I could still her it, "HOWE!" The elf tending to me jerked away at the sound of the shout and fell back as I pushed myself up. Heaving breath after breath I looked around, I was in the Grey Warden encampment inside of one of the tents reserved for the wounded. The elf was saying something but I wasn't hearing him.

"Where's Duncan?" I said, voice raspy, she just stared at me dumbstruck.

"Recruit, you just went through an experience I wouldn't wish on anyone, even the worst of your kind." The elf tried to push me back down to the cot but I pushed his hands away and gave his a firm stare.

"Duncan, where is he?" I repeated slowly stressing each word.

"Fine, I'll get him", the elf wandered out of the tent muttering something about the diminishing quality of shem recruits. A minute later he returned, bringing the dark skinned warden commander along with him.

"Ah Gareth, I'm good to see you awake and moving, though I will have to concur with Remus here, you should rest." Duncan said putting his arm on my shoulder.

I pushed it off and got shakily to my feet, "I'll rest when I'm in the ground Duncan, I came with you because of duty and I intend to do it." At this Duncan just shook his head and stood next to me, reaching into his belt. He raised his hand to reveal a small silver amulet with a small dark red jewel, no, an ampoule, containing a very memorable substance. "Is that?"

"This is the warden's oath; it contains a small sample of the blood we drink to become what we are. It represents our new life and those who failed to make it this far." I took the necklace, remembering Jory and Daveth's deaths. "Make sure those that we have lost did not die in vain."

I put on the necklace its weight settling next to my silver leaf, when I suddenly remembered "Nessa, the mage, what about them, are they alive as well"

Duncan moved to leave the tent but stopped with one arm on the flap, he looked around at me, "Nessa and William also survived the joining, though they awoke much earlier than you, both are fine, we were more worried about your condition." He then left me to the ministrations of the other warden.

I looked to him, all I was wearing were leather breeches along with "Remus was it, where are my weapons and armor?" the elf looked at me and sighed, finally seeming to realize he wasn't going to stop me from leaving, now that I looked closer I could see that the elf was dalish like Nessa, though with harsher facial tattoos.

"Your sword and axe are at the arms tent, they will be returned to you by the quartermaster, your armor was barely being held together, dents scratches and plating damage, I'm surprised it held up as well as it had, it was ancient."

"It was my father's, was it truly that bad?"

"We have a dwarven smith who joined the wardens here, he informed us that work had been attempted but it was shoddy shore up work at best and it was a miracle it stayed together with the age he put it at, he is fitting something more suitable for you, you're to pick it up whenever you felt ready to move, which I suppose is now."

"Damn smith, he'd told me he fixed the old set, paid him a good amount too, well it had been good armor and had served me well enough" I thanked the old elfand walked out into the camp.

An hour later I walked out of the armorer's tent in new plate armor, it was similar to what Alistair had been wearing but less bulky, it felt good, and certainly fit better than my previous armor, I was larger than my father and his armor had never fit me very well. I also had my sword slung across my back and the darkspawn alpha's axe at my belt in a new sling. I don't know why I felt compelled to keep the thing but it just seemed too fine a weapon just to leave around, the smith had looked askance at the maker's mark adorning the blade, it was apparently the symbol of house Aeducan, the current royal house of Orzammar. Whoever the blade had belonged to, they had been important.

"Gareth!" I turned to see Will and Nessa moving through the tents in my direction, Drey at their heels, I'd been looking for the dog. As I knelt down to give Drey a scratch on the head, Will gave me a pat on the back.

"By the Maker, I'm glad you're alright." He turned to Nessa who was hanging back watching the both of us. "I told you Nessa, Gareth's too stubborn to let a little thing like poisonous blood take him down, I survived didn't I?"

Nessa just smiled and looked at me with her large green eyes "Thank you Gareth, I'm glad you're alive as well, if you had passed I would have been left alone with this fool shem, you at least have some measure of sense." Will scowled but when he dropped his head I could see he was smiling.

"The core group is still together against all odds, that's what I find important." Will said quietly.

"Core group, what shit are you spouting now mage?" I asked him trying to avoid Drey's tongue.

The mage looked embarrassed and began rubbing the back of his head, one of his nervous habits, "Well you me and Nessa, we came with Duncan together, not to disrespect Daveth and Jory, Maker rest their souls, but you are the comrades I came with and despite our differences we survived and you have to admit we work well together." He looked at me and Nessa hopefully "We three make a good team" To this statement Drey gave an argumentative bark and started growling at the young mage you leapt back and wave his arms, "Okay sorry, sorry Drey, four, the four of us make a good team." The dog nodded its head and went back to harassing me. The mage just looked at him strangely before turning to me again. "You saw that right, I'm not crazy this dog is way too smart"

I just grinned "Smarter then you mage?" to which Nessa just laughed and Will to grin sheepishly.

"Anyway Gareth, we were sent to tell you that Duncan wants us to attend a meeting between himself and the king to discuss the teyrn's new plan." Nessa cut in before the mage could retort. "It's being held as we speak"

"All right lead on" I got up ready to follow these two looking at each in turn, a naïve joking mage and a Dalish elven huntress, core group indeed, though I had to admit, as stupid as it sounded, I liked it all the same.

(Hours Later)

I ducked my head as the tower above us exploded from the force of the flaming projectile, I raised my shield over Nessa's head to block any falling debris, Alistair doing the same for Will, when the dust settled I looked up to scan our surroundings. The battle was in full swing down below in the valley, the screams and howls of dying men and darkspawn alike pierced the night along with the sounds of explosions and the crash of metal on metal as the two sides fought.

"We have to get to the tower, cross the bridge while they reload the siege weapons Alistair yelled leading us in a charge over the bridge overlooking the valley passing crews of men and archers firing arrows, bolts and ballista shots into the horde below.

Our duty was an important one if less dangerous than that of the other wardens, while they joined the king in the vanguard against the darkspawn, myself, Alistair Nessa, and Will were to move to the tower of Ishal, an old crumbling tower that was being had been renovated into a signal tower, we were to oversee the lighting of the torch once the signal was given. When the torch was lit, Teyrn Lohgain and his men would flank the horde in an all-out charge which would cripple their advance and stop their retreat. All in all a good plan, if we could make it without getting killed first.

As we reached the foot of the tower Nessa suddenly grabbed her head as if in pain, I put my arm on her shoulder and shook her, "Nessa what's wrong we need to keep moving"

"The singing, the noise, it's coming from the tower, dozens of voices." She said, a blank look on her face, I just looked at Alistair confused. He had a concerned look on his face looking from Nessa to the tower.

"She's sensing the darkspawn, like all wardens do, though some wardens have a much greater ability to do this than others, they are able to distinguish individual numbers from a much greater distance," He turned back to the elf "Nessa, you're certain you can feel them coming from the tower, not below?"

"No they are definitely on the tower." She responded with a pained look, Alistair swore under his breath.

"If the tower is truly lost then it's our duty to get to the beacon and light it ourselves, without it the battle is hopeless."

**-Nessa Mahariel-**

I wished I was wrong, I really did, but with how loud the noise was singing in the back of my head I knew it was a childish hope, the darkspawn were in the tower.

I'd almost expected the singing to stop once I had become a grey warden; it had plagued me since I awoke in my keepers tent, the constant sound at the back of my mind. Undertaking the joining however seemed to have only tempered the noise, while at a distance I heard nothing, a blessing I had enjoyed, now that the horde was upon us I could feel each note in my mind, as well as make out the presence of each of the darkspawn calling out to it in response.

As we entered the tower courtyard, all I could hear was screams and yells from inside, I could also make out the shapes of some of the darkspawn attacking the outer guards, the attack had come from within somehow, bypassing the guards and taking the tower by surprise.

Alistair ran ahead and drew his sword pointing at each of us, "Try and support the surviving guards, Will cast support and blow apart any separate darkspawn groups you see" The mage nodded and raised his staff and began chanting under his breath, he then raised his hand and sent a bolt of fire at a pair of darkspawn who were closing in on an injured soldier, blowing them apart in a explosion of heat and burning flesh.

Raising my bow I nocked my arrow and sighted a distant darkspawn which had noticed our presence, entering a state of calm. One quick breath later the creature was falling to the ground an arrow in its neck and my bow was drawn again, it was almost too easy. I thanked the creators for my mentors in the clan and for the newfound awareness, disturbing as it was. As dark as it was with only torches to provide light, I could still accurately place each darkspawn exactly, it was simply a matter of placing an arrow in them.

Gareth and Alistair were off on the far side of the courtyard facing off against three large darkspawn. Alistair dispatched his opponent with a stab to the gut while Gareth slammed the side of his shield into another's face, turning quickly to block an incoming swing. He knocked the creature off its feet while it was unbalanced and brought his sword down to silence its screams. As we dispatched the last darkspawn, we made a note of the survivors, most of whom were either too heavily injured or frightened to assist us any further. As we made our way through the tower we encountered heavy resistance from the darkspwn, from the looks of things the horde had splintered, sending this group in through a system of caves the ran underneath the tower, from there it was a simple matter of breaking through into the basements and attacking the tower proper.

"I don't understand, there wasn't supposed to be any resistance here." Alistair said sounding somewhat panicked as we moved through the levels.

"You were complaining to Duncan about not being in the battle earlier, weren't you?" Gareth responded, leaning against a stone arch taking a quick breath and stretching his sword arm. The mage wasn't much better, having been forced to use his spells against multiple groups of darkspawn.

The gore left behind wasn't helping matters, the mage alone had already taken much of my herbal supply, and the carnage had been brutal around the soldier's quarters and still looked somewhat pale. I wasn't doing so well myself, if this is what a large number of darkspawn could do, I shuddered to think at what the whole horde running unchecked might do.

"Yeah, you're right; I guess there is a silver lining to this after all." Alistair stated with a laugh, by the creators the shem made for a decent leader in battle but his humor left much to be desired. Either wants to fight, or don't, choose one.

We were forced to clear the tower floors as we moved along but with Will's magic and a bit of patient thinking we managed to move ahead without much difficulty until we reached a large door which Alistair bolted through quickly.

"This should be the top floor; we've surely missed the signal, lets…" The Templar stopped dead in his tracks looking straight ahead. Gareth bowled into him with a quick curse and rounded on him.

"What's wrong!? Light the damn… Oh shit" he said turning wide eyed to see what we were all looking at.

-END

A/N: I just recently hit over 1000 views, honestly I thought I'd be lucky if 10 people read what I wrote, thank you to everyone who has dropped a favorite, given a review, and who just took time out of your day to read and follow the story. Thank you all so much. With classes going on right now it's getting harder to find time to get these down but you all motivate me to keep it going.


	8. Chapter 8

**NEW TRIALS**

**-William Amell-**

"Oh shit" Gareth exclaimed dryly as we looked on the heaving horned mass of flesh and muscle in the center of the room.

"Get down" Nessa hissed suddenly pulling me behind some wooden debris, Alistair and Gareth went down behind a nearby stone arch near the stairs.

Whatever it was, it was massive with mottled skin and two enormous horns curling up from the sides of its head. At the moment it was hunched over chewing on the remains of some poor soldier, probably the poor sod who tried to light the signal before us, and hadn't yet noticed us.

"Alistair" I said turning to the junior warden, "What is that thing?"

"An ogre" the warden replied quietly "they're the largest of any known breed of darkspawn, though they're supposed to be mostly active only in the deep roads, the last one on the surface was over a decade ago and it was heavily wounded, forced out by others of its kind."

"Well this one's here now, and it's blocking the signal fire" Gareth shot back at us "Give us specifics, how do we kill it."

Alistair looked panicked and scratched at his head, "Damn it, uh, Grey Warden lore states that ogres are thick skinned, and are extraordinarily hard to kill." The glare that Gareth shot Alistair was like ice "That's it?!", Alistair looked at him defensively "What, it's been years since the wardens have fought anything like this, the best I can remember from the records is that they heal fast, so if your bringing one down go for the head or heart, or burn them, they won't go down otherwise"

I gripped my staff tightly and stood up "If it needs to burn, I'll burn it, I just need some time to build up, I think I only have one big one left in me." Alistair looked at me and nodded, "I'll distract it then, be quick about it though" He drew his sword and ran out around the side of the room until he was facing the ogre. "Hey! You ugly bastard!" The monster looked up from its bloody meal growling, it then gave off an earsplitting roar, spraying the warden in gore and spittle. Alistair began slamming the face of his shield with his sword, enraging the ogre further.

"Shem's going to get himself killed." Nessa muttered, she ran out from the wooden barricade peppering the beasts back with arrows as she went. The beast spun around wildly giving off another loud cry of pain.

Gareth just looked at the two of them and then turned to look at me and shrugged giving an exasperated sigh. "Shit, don't fuck up mage, I'm about to do something really stupid" He drew his sword off his back and gave a loud battle cry as he charged out right at the Ogre, the ogre turned to look at him with a look of surprise on its face.

I was just as dumbstruck "Must've never had anyone charge him before." I then remembered what I was supposed to be doing and mentally kicked myself, Come on idiot their doing this for a reason. I started chanting, drawing the incantations from memory, the runes along my staff began to burn red with heat. I could feel the draw on my mana, I'd been feeling run down ever since we'd entered the tower, blasting through the darkspawn had worn me down and this spell would be difficult to pull off even at my best. A sudden roar from the ogre forced me to look to the side to see how my comrades were faring.

The Ogre was covered in arrows courtesy of Nessa, however it seemed that she was running low on arrows, forcing her to pick her shots with care. Gareth and Alistair in the meantime continued to harry the beasts legs, with one distracting the ogre while the other attacked from behind slashing at its hide. They were wearing it down but I could see that they were tiring; I wasn't the only one who spent themselves climbing this tower. The constant attacks were hurting the monster but the arrows for the most part only served to piss it off, while the two warriors were unable to cut very deeply into its skin and tendons without fear of losing their swords when the beast swung around to counterattack.

With a scream of pain from a sword to the thigh, the ogre turned around and lashed out with its armored boot, however this time Gareth was unable to dodge in time, the creature's leg impacted with a sickening crunch of metal sending Gareth flying back with a grunt. The beast advanced, ignoring attempts at distraction from Nessa and Alistair.

I couldn't wait any longer; I stepped out from the safety of the barricade "Gareth! Shit, Nessa, Alistair, get down!" The spell wasn't ready yet but with the beast advancing on the injured noble. "Please work, please work, and please work" I raised my staff, bristling with power. A burst of flame shot out and hit the monster square in the face, screaming the beast pawed at its face trying to claw off the flames searing its face and burning its eyes, blinding it.

"Hah, great shot Will!" Alistair ran at the flailing beast and jumped into its chest, the force of the bulky warrior's tackle pushing the creature back causing it to fall. Nessa ran up from behind him, drawing a long curved dagger from her belt as she scrambled onto the darkspawn's heaving chest. With a scream she brought it down deep into the ogre's skull. The large creature shuddered for a few seconds as its brain fired off wildly in its death throes before finally falling silent, arms dropping to its side.

Nessa yanked out her dagger, wiping the gore off on a piece of cloth, looking at the fallen monster with a look of disgust. "How many such creatures travel with the horde even now?" she said to no one in particular.

"No one has managed to get a good estimate of the horde, the warden's lightest estimates put the darkspawn's numbers in the tens of thousands." Alistair responded pointing a finger at the dead ogre, "Within the hordes of blights past there were said to be dozens of ogres active in the field, which is as you can imagine a bad thing for us and each on pales in the face of the archdemon." Seeing the look on her face, he put his hand on her shoulder comfortingly, "But what's important is that we can beat them if we work together, and this ogre certainly won't be hurting anyone ever again because of us."

Meanwhile I just focused on tending to Gareth using magic to delve the worst of his injuries, who had come to soon after I began treatment. "I'm alright." He said gruffly trying to push me away, "I'm alright, I was just stunned"

"No you're not alright, in fact if it weren't for the quality of the armor your wearing, you'd probably have been broken in half, as is, you have two cracked or broken rips and heavy bruising on your sides" He flinched as I tapped his head "And probably a concussion to boot from the way you hit your head."

"Good work with the spell mage" he said in a quiet voice, I looked at him shocked, "Compliments from you Gareth, yeah, definitely a concussion, or even something more serious"

"Fuck you" he growled, I just grinned, he'd be fine and we were all alive.

**-Alistair- **

By the Maker, that damn that thing smelt worse than the cheese they had back at camp that the procurement officer stuck the wardens with. Looking over the state of the situation however I had to admit things went better than expected given how far things went to shit. The tower had proved to be a great loss; many had died within its halls. The knowledge that the darkspawn, especially something like an ogre, could have moved this far into the armies main camp, was also a sobering realization.

No, every one of his recruits was okay and the signal was clear, Nessa was in the process of lighting the kindling. Everything had gone very well, although they had almost certainly missed the original signal. "Lohgain had better be ready to charge after all this trouble"

Soon enough the signal was lit and burning strong, sending off brightly colored smoke into the dark night. From one of the towers windows, it was easy to see where Lohgain's cavalry stood just outside the battlefield, which at the moment was just a storm of fire, metal and screams. "Alistair something's wrong with the teyrn's forces" Nessa stated beside him, her eyes shining in the night, elves could see better over long distances, I shouldn't be surprised that that extended to better vision at night as well.

"What do you see Nessa? What's wrong?"

"The men were supposed to charge after seeing the signal, but their moving in the opposite direction, their fleeing!"

"What!" I spun back around, she was right, I could steadily see the torches outlining the force moving away from the battlefield, away from the king and wardens who needed him, "What is he doing, he can't, we need to get down there we…" A sharp cry of pain made him spin around; Will had been helping Gareth who at the moment was crouched getting his bearing looked back at me with a look of surprise on his face, a twisted arrow in his chest. "What"

A loud cry roared through the room as a large group of darkspawn broke into the room. "We're under attack!" I cried out drawing my sword and running at the spawn. I wondered the hell had this group gotten so far when I saw the alpha in their midst, the darkspawn were still in the tower and throughout the battlefield, I sensed them everywhere, Nessa may have been more skilled at locating them but she was still new to the joining. An alpha had ways of dulling the grey warden tracking ability. Damn it, I got cocky and now Will is down.

Suddenly the darkspawn in front of me parted to reveal a line of archers, "Shit" I held up my shield quickly and avoid any facial shots while my armor stopped the worst of them, I still felt an arrow enter my side and leg, forcing me to the ground in pain while one advanced on me with a bloody sword raised. Nessa was at my side in an instant putting an arrow into three of the creatures and swinging her knife across the sword wielding darkspawn's throat. Gareth was with her as well, injured as he was, sword swinging, a look of rage on his face.

It looked as if they might actually manage to fight there out of this until Nessa let a blade slip past her guard. As she fell to the ground, I felt hope die. Gareth just let out another animalistic cry and separated the offending darkspawns head from its shoulders, even he was brought down shortly after, body riddled with arrows, he'd managed to kill three more of the creatures before he fell to the ground snarling, a Hurlock backhanding him across the face finally silenced him.

I shut my eyes, damn it, we did our job, we lit the signal against all odds. We fought our way up this damn tower, killed a bloody ogre for nothing, damn you Lohgain, Maker damn you to the furthest pits for this! The alpha stood above me, its sick twisted grin looking down. Before it could finish me off I grabbed up my fallen sword and stabbed it in the throat, I would have laughed at the surprised look on its face if I wasn't in so much pain from the arrows. The other creatures roared in hatred. Damn, I looked at my squad one last time, we'd finally managed some semblance of coordination, and each was a boon to the wardens in their own was, wasted without any pay off. A small part of me hoped Cailan was at least alive, because Fereldan was about to lose one handsome bastard. However a screech roared out from above as a dark shape entered the room distracting the darkspawn. It looked almost like a giant bird, but, no way. Then my world slipped to black and I suddenly knew nothing.

**-Gareth Cousland- **

The darkness was back, however unlike with the joining there were no cries of murderous monsters or alluring songs, this was just darkness. And pain, don't forget the pain, well at least this meant I was probably alive, probably. The last thing I remembered was Will with an arrow sticking out of his chest, and then I'd fallen to the redness, I vaguely remembered killing some of the darkspawn but from my current status I was probably overwhelmed, but if so, why was I not dead. Nessa and Alistair had been talking about Lohgain turning tail and running, which in itself was strange, I'd grown up hearing stories of the Hero of River Dane since I was a boy, why would he run, and anyway it was doubtful that if he ran like they said, he would bother sending soldiers to help secure the tower if it was already lost.

"Oh you're finally awake" a familiar voice rang out, my eyes opened. I was lying on a soft bed within a dimly lit hut. Looking around I could see a small fire burning in its brazier being tended to by a women I certainly remembered.

"You're the girl, the one from the wilds." I answered slowly

"My name is Morrigan, lest you've forgotten"

"Yeah I remember you and your crazy mother ah" I tried to move but found I was heavily bound by bandages across my chest.

"I wouldn't move much for the time being, you were heavily injured, tis a struggle even for mother, I'm honestly surprised you survived at all even the elf's wounds were not so great."

"Elf, Nessa! I was with comrades, the elf, a mage, and man, are they alright, and the battle how did the battle fare, Duncan, and the king"

"They are alive, and in much better condition than yourself, they are waiting for your condition to improve. The battle was lost and most of the army slain, I do not know of this Duncan, however your king has fallen. Your companions, especially the blonde one, have been moping around for the last few days." She said with a sigh

Damn it all, everyone dead again, just like that night, Duncan was a good man and a skilled warrior, he deserved better, a lot of people deserved better, oh my god Drey was on the field to with the rest of the dogs, damn it was I going to lose him too! "Well considering that many of them, especially Alistair, had friends and connections with the army I would say that is understandable."

"And you think they would encourage his blubbering, if so then they are not like the grey wardens of legend I have heard of." She said indignantly.

I just shrugged then grimaced as another wave of pain lanced through my chest. "Well legends sometimes surprise you."

"Maybe, maybe not, either way, my mother wished to speak to you all once you had recovered, she is waiting outside." She turned to leave the hut.

I held my hand out ignoring my discomfort. "Wait, I have one more question if you don't mind?"

"State your question, I may have an answer" great, the swamp witch was going to be difficult, oh well, this needed to be asked.

"Why did you save us from the darkspawn on that tower?"

She turned back to me from her place by the door, smiling and raising her hands, "I truly do not know, twas my mother who saved you, not I, I would have tried saving your king or some other scion of nobility, the ransom from such a figure would be much higher than that of some wayward grey warden recruits."

"Yes much more." I replied dryly, she just gave that infuriating smile again,

"It's good to have such a positive outlook on your own worth, well then mother must be told of your improvement. I'm certain I'll here no end to her boasting, anyway I believe I'll stay and cook dinner instead, you seem able to tell her yourself." She moved back to the burning brazier and with a wave of her arm made the flames leap.

"Damn witch" It was all I could mutter in response, I think the women actually giggled, her hearing must have been incredible. Getting up from the bed was difficult enough with how my chest was bandaged but in the end I managed to scramble into some breeches and a soft woolen, it was a bit small but I thought I'd rather be grateful and try to ignore the small bloodstains that dotted it near some rough patchwork.

Walking out of the dark hut I was immediately blinded by the bright sunlight, shading my eyes I looked around and saw Will and Nessa sitting by a small campfire, Alistair was standing on a bank with Morrigan's mother overlooking the small lake which the hut sat beside.

The mother saw me first and cackled a little bit to herself, a smile on her face "See, here is your fellow grey warden, all of you worry too much."

Alistair and the others turned around at her voice and saw me shambling out towards them, when he saw me Alistair's eyes widened, "You, your alive, we thought you were dead for sure."

"By the Maker your alive, when Morrigan's mother wouldn't give us a straight answer, even when I saw you, we thought you were a goner but…" Will caught me in a bear-hug which hurt like hell because of my ribs while Nessa just stood back bowing her head in relief.

"Yes I am though not for lack of trying, thanks to Morrigan's mother, now get off idiot!" Will stepped back but Alistair's face grew darker, tears threatening to flow.

"This, it doesn't seem real we're a still alive me, you, Nessa, Will, but Duncan, the others, even the king, their all dead along with the rest of the army, we'd be too if it wasn't for Morrigan's mother"

"Don't talk about me as if I wasn't present lad"

"I, I didn't mean, but what do we call you? You never gave us your name"

"Names are useless, the Chasind call me Flemeth, I suppose that will have to do." My ears perked up at that one.

"The Flemeth, from the legends, Daveth was right, you're…you're a witch of the wilds aren't you."

Nessa suddenly walked past and bowed before the old women, eyes lowered "_Andaran atish'an Asha'bellanar _my people have spun tales of you for centuries, it is an honor_"_The old woman just looked at her in surprise and made a rising motion with her hand.

"It has been many years since one of the people has called me by that name, rise, you need not bow, I had forgotten the Dalish's love of ceremony." Nessa did as she asked, but her gaze never left the witch, in her eyes a look of respect and…fear?

"What does witch of the wilds mean anyway, I know a bit of magic and it has served you all very well has it not?"

"I suppose we should thank you again then Flemeth." Will said looking over from where we stood.

"If you know what's good for you, I suppose you should." She shot back in an annoyed voice

I elbowed the mage in the ribs causing him to flinch and look around, "If you could avoid pissing off the great witch of legend please.." He just shrugged apologetically a grin of embarrassment on his face.

"But if you are so powerful then why didn't you save Duncan, he is, was, our leader?" Alistair stated, a touch of anger entering his voice.

Flemeth just gazed at him with a sad look in her eye, like a parent viewing a misbehaving child, "I am sorry for your Duncan, but grief must come later, deal with dark shadows before you take vengeance as my mother always said, duty must come now" The shadow of my father's met that statement, what was my duty, I joined the wardens to stop the blight but they were gone, Howe still lived but I was farther away from him than ever.

Flemeth must have noticed my moment of hesitation "It has always been the Grey Wardens duty to unite the land against the blight, or did that change when I wasn't looking."

"It changed when most of us were slaughtered" Nessa interjected sullenly

"If you believe small numbers mean that you are powerless then you're already lost" Flemeth said as an aside, Nessa blushed furiously.

"But we were fighting the darkspawn, Cailan was beating them, why did Lohgain do this?!" Alistair shouted.

"Now that is a good question, men hold shadows in their hearts darker than any tainted creature, perhaps he believes that the blight is an enemy he can outmaneuver. Perhaps he doesn't see the true evil behind the threat." Flemeth said sagely.

"The archdemon" Alistair stated darkly "With it leading the darkspawn and no army to stop it, Lohgain must believe the blight is only a minor threat."

Will lowered his head dejectedly "The darkspawn killed most everyone, there are a few survivors by Morrigan's count who have fled to the northern regions to regroup but many have been taken prisoner by the darkspawn, they're dragging people underground Gareth."

I perked up, what of Fergus, no he had to be okay, I'd lost too much already, I asked out of concern though, no one should be forced to suffer at the hands of the darkspawn "Is there any chance of mounting a rescue, they could still be saved couldn't they?"

"A foolish action, if the horde has them then they are lost" Morrigan mother put in.

Alistair grit his teeth, "Yes, she's right, we're in no condition to help anyone, we can barely help ourselves at this point? Damn him, if Arl Eamon knew what Lohgain did he wouldn't stand for it, the landsmeet wouldn't stand for it, they'd be the first to call for his execution."

I turned to him and shook my head, "Even if we could get to Arl Eamon, why would he believe us, or have you forgotten that Lohgain is a hero and probably one of the most respected men in the country, and we're just four wardens with a wild story. Plus…" I raised my hand pointing at him, Nessa, Will, and myself in turn, "Why would he even deign to see us, we have a Dalish elf, which have never mixed well with nobles, a mage who the chantry would in no way allow near an Arl, and a noble from a fallen house, regardless while he could maybe, maybe, give us the resources to bring down Lohgain, we'd need more than the arl's men to quell a full-fledged blight, we'd need an army."

Alistair just looked at me pleadingly "Listen, Gareth I know the Arl, he's a good man, he can help us, as too stopping the blight." The man talked as if he knew the Arl personally, strange.

I was about to respond when Nessa suddenly cut in, "Surely there are other allies we could call on, even in case your Arl refuses us, I mean we're wardens during a blight." Alistair looked pensive when his face suddenly lit up.

"The treaties, of course Nessa that's genius, they allow the wardens to call on Dwarves, elves, mages, each faction would be required by oath to give us aid."

"I may be old…" Flemeth interrupted "but dwarves, elves, mages, this Arl Eamon and who knows what else, this sounds like the beginnings of an army to me"

I voiced the obvious concern plaguing this little plan, "Alistair the treaties, we don't have them, they were back in camp, unless you carried them with you all this time." Alistair's face fell but Flemeth merely cackled and took a long tube out of as pocket in her dress

"Here you are, the treaties lie inside, unharmed and ready for use" I just stared at her, she just gave a small chuckle.

"Boy, when you live for as long as I have, you learn to keep tabs on important items, especially those you would fear to lose." She handed the tube to Alistair who took it in trembling hands.

Alistair turned to each of us a look of trepidation and excitement on his face, "So can we do this, go to Redcliffe and these other places, and build an army?"

Will looked nervously at his feet rubbing the back of his head, "I don't know, I doubt it will be as easy as that Alistair."

Flemeth stared at him knowingly, "Nothing important ever is child remember that." Will looked at her and then turned away muttering something about a mouse and tests?

"So you are set then, ready to be Grey Wardens?" Flemeth stared at each of us in turn. Honestly I had only one goal in mind and it involved a head on a spike, I'd lost too much to believe otherwise, but my father's final words rang through my head again, "Our family always does its duty first"

"I am" My voice sounded heavy, Nessa and Will quickly nodded and gave voiced their willingness as well.

Nessa bowed her head again at the old witch, "_Ma serannas Asha'belannar" _

The old one merely shook her head "No, thank you, I am not the grey warden here, though before you go, there is but one more thing I can offer you"

Morrigan walked out of the hut and strode quickly over to Flemeth, "The stew is bubbling mother and dinner is prepared, will we have four guests for the eve?" She turned to look at us her golden eyes shining making it seem as if a wold stared at me, not a woman.

"The grey wardens will be leaving shortly girl, and you will be joining them."

"Such a shame… what?

Oh great, I thought to myself, my chest wounds brought on a new spasm of pain in response.

(Hours later)

"So can you cook?" Alistair asked again when the witch wouldn't answer him.

"I… can cook," He perked up at that "Great you can substitute for me then, all I can make is charred rabbit and stew."

"I also possess knowledge of many types of unique poisonous herbs and mixes, many of which can be found in this area in fact."

Will quickly ran to Alistair's rescue. "That's very interesting Morrigan, but don't worry though you don't have to cook for us if you really don't want too. Right Alistair?" The mage looked at the warden recruit seriously.

Shit, charred rabbit from now on I suppose, I adjusted the straps of my pack with my free hand, Flemeth had worked a little more healing before we went, I still had some scars from what looked like arrows but I didn't mind much, between them and vivid gash on my neck I seemed to be collecting them in earnest. She also said the pain would pass by the day's end and I would be good as new.

Since leaving the hut and Flemeth behind, Morrigan had contented herself to either walking far enough away behind the rest of us or needling Alistair, much to the warden's chargrin. The plan was simple, we would make our way to a small trading outpost named Lothering, the town was close by and would allow us to restock on provisions and obtain information. We were still unclear as to what we would do after that but we all agreed we'd cross that road when we came to it. A sudden singing in my head however broke my reverie, turning around I saw that Nessa, Will, and Alistair had had similar reactions, dropping their packs and reaching for weapons. "Shit, Morrigan I thought you said we'd be able to avoid the darkspawn."

She looked around alerted and grabbed her staff, "I did, and these must be stragglers chasing something else."

"Chasing what!" I shouted when a loud series of barks broke through the evening air, I saw a look of alarm cross their faces, turning around I suddenly was charged by a mess of brown hair, forcing me to the ground.

-End

**A/N: All right everyone I am officially done with the Ostagar part of the campaign and we are going on to Lothering. Classes are getting pretty heavy so I'm pretty sure the length of time between chapters will increase, though I doubt it will be too much longer than this one was. I am planning on introducing a few characters to the group as well as giving a shout out to DA2, while they won't play a major role in this story, the Hawke family are likely to appear in some context, however like Gareth said though, I have no clue where to go first in the story, though I have a few ideas. Thank you for all of your reviews, follows, and favorites, you guys make doing this so much easier.**


	9. Chapter 9

**TO LOTHERING**

**-Nessa Mahairel-**

It happened fast, ever since we'd left Flemeth's hut the call of the darkspawn had become a constant sound in my ear, a sound that you barely hear but know it's there. Alistair said the sound was due to our proximity with the horde and that my sharper senses were just picking them up at a higher distance. He said that Duncan had explained it to him once, and had assured him that the voices would fade once sufficient distance had been gained. I hoped so; I thought I'd be done with the voices once I joined the wardens, though at least they weren't completely constant, they had been mercifully absent during our stay at the hut.

Suddenly the call reached new heights and I could feel a small group of darkspawn in the distance closing on our group fast, then a loud chorus of barking split the air and I was being barreled down by a solid mass of white fur. A grunt to the right told that Gareth had suffered a similar fate. I reached for my knife until I realized that the creature wasn't attacking me, merely trying to cover me in slobber, I opened my eyes to see a pair of large blue eyes staring back at me.

"Drey, hey, Drey, lay off, I know it's good to see you too boy!" Gareth was laughing trying to push the overexcited dog off of him with Drey fighting him at every step. Morrigan and Alistair stayed back Alistair looked relieved, Morrigan was just watching the exchange with little interest.

"Dogs? Wait Gareth is that Drey, I thought he and all the other hounds were…? Hah! I knew that he'd be okay!" Will ran forward to hug Drey with a smile on his face shooting praises at the big animal; the dog returned his affection in spades. Once he'd managed to back off from the dog's affectionate assault, he turned to get a good look at the dog sitting calmly near Nessa, "I get Drey, but what's with the other dog?"

"That's the dog from the kennels, the sick one you helped earlier isn't it" Gareth looked at the hound dumbstruck "It must've managed to get through the whole of the horde and track your scent, he and Drey must have met up on the way here. Incredible"

"But why would she come for me specifically, I only ever saw him twice?" It was way to convenient, I'd worried about the dog and had just hoped that someone had managed to free her or at least give him mercy before the Darkspawn got to her in the camp.

"Why do these dogs do anything, I'm telling you, they're smarter than they appear to be, they probably were planning… ah!" Will started saying before Gareth hit him across the back of the head.

"They're smarter then you at least mage, Nessa, it probably imprinted with you during one of the times you saw it, it probably even knows that you're the one who helped it, these hounds honor that commitment." He pointed at the dog that was at the moment sitting on its haunches then back to me. "It will follow you wherever you choose to go and will defend you to the end, least that's what my father told me when he gave me Drey, they don't just imprint to anyone though honestly, its considered a great honor in this country to have one follow you, they're the best friend you can ever hope for if you treat them right."

I was hesitant to acknowledge the hound at my feet at first, was I even capable of taking care of a war dog? The closest I'd ever come to keeping a pet was a small squirrel I found when I was very young, it wasn't so bad, but once it had gotten bigger it just ran off and drew the attention of a nearby injured wolf that had been hunting near the camp for easy prey, it attacked, killing the squirrel and would have likely killed me had a hunter not stepped in.

The creatures' death devastated me for weeks and I'd pretty much avoided anything resembling a pet since, I also avoided getting anywhere close to a wolf again, despite teasing from the other hunters in the clan. Tamlen had done his best to set them in line… NO! Don't think about Tamlen.

The dog just looked at me and whined, sensing my discomfort, I got down on one knee and hugged the beast, how bad could owning a hound be, if I needed help I could probably just talk to Gareth, he seemed to know a lot about dogs and the like.

"I hate to break up the reunion, it's very touching, but there are still darkspawn coming from that direction and I believe your mongrels led them to us." Morrigan said casually, suddenly the weight of the situation hit home and the voices came rushing back, strange, I suppose it was possible to tune them out.

"The witch is right mostly." Gareth stated shooting a glare at Morrigan then turning to direct each of us towards the tree line the dogs had exited. "Will, Witch! Prepare to hit the darkspawn that appear with everything you've got!" Will nodded in confirmation and began to chant under his breath, the runes on his staff began to glow a fiery crimson. Morrigan began to follow suit after giving an icy glance in Gareth's direction, frost building in her grasp. "Nessa! Use your arrows to pick off as many survivors that make it through, also," he pointed at the dog at my feet who was now growling at my feet, tell the hound to stop and do this, he made a downward gesture with his open palm, It should be trained to recognize this sign and should stop it from rushing the darkspawn when they appear.

"Okay" I caught the dog's attention and told it to stay, and amazingly enough the dog seemed to understand. I then drew an arrow and took position to the side of the mages, feeling the mounting mix of heat and cold radiating from the pair.

"Alistair, hang back and help me mop up any that make it this far." I'd expected the ranking warden to bristle at being ordered around by a new recruit but the man merely nodded, looking relieved that someone had taken command of the situation and took a position at the noble side sword drawn and shield raised. A cry rang through the air as a group consisting of hurlocks and smaller genlocks burst into the fading sunlight and charged at us screaming in glee at the prospect of more killing.

"Now!" Gareth's voice cried out, prompting the mages to release blasts of fire and ice, completely ravaging the approaching monsters. The group behind it merely carried on, stepping over the charred frozen corpses of their comrades only to be met with more renewed strikes from the pair of magi. After barely more than a minute had passed the darkspawn lay slain by the sheer force of magic, I myself only fired a single arrow through the eye hole of helmeted alpha who had survived by the grace of its armor taking most of the damage. Alistair and Gareth merely moved among the darkspawn killing the unlucky few that had survived the onslaught, the hounds alerting them whenever they found one.

Morrigan was looking rather pleased with herself and was mouthing off the praises of magic to no one in particular, while Will however was looking at Gareth, Alistair, and I with some trepidation showing across his face saying nothing, something notably uncharacteristic of him.

"By the Maker! I can see why Duncan wanted a few more mages that was…something." Alistair declared looking out at the carnage then at Gareth who was at the moment dispatching a loud genlock with an appraising eye.

The hound was coming back to me barking happily, a pouch in its maw.

"What do you have there?" I asked taking the small pouch and opening it to reveal a variety of objects, most of it was made up by shiny gemstones, but the pouch also contained a variety of glistening dwarven coins both gold and silver. I realized that the pouch must've come from a particularly greedy darkspawn, well likely these belonged to some poor victim of the horde like the owner of Gareth's new axe so I doubted anyone would mind me taking them, our funds were low at the moment and these jewels especially would go a long way towards procuring us some supplies. "Good boy, ah, that's right I never learned your name, I just can't call you Dog the rest of your life now can I." I thought for a moment on a name, "Gareth said you'd be the best friend I could ever hope for, so how about Falon, it means friend in my people's tongue, does that work?" The hound gave a bark of approval and started nodding its head, maybe the mage was on to something, and the dog seemed to legitimately understand everything I had said.

**-William Amell-**

That was intense, the whole experience, being able to fully let loose with my magic was exhilarating to say the least. It was also terrifying, this was the first time I had seen just how much I could do with my magic, I mean two mages wiped out a whole squad of darkspawn in barely any time at all. I could see now why the Templars were scared of us, I'd always heard them preaching how a single mage could light a city on fire, and they were right.

The scary thing was how easy it was becoming to summon more power, I must be getting used to using my new equipment. Fire spells especially were becoming much easier to use when I channeled through the staff.

Morrigan was had been taking the whole thing in stride since the incident and was walking with even more swagger in her step. I just moved next to Alistair who was chatting animatedly with Gareth. "Ah…Will come here." Alistair exclaimed clapping a hand on my back hard causing me to stumble a bit. "Gareth and I were just discussing the fight back there, if every mage can do that, we should definitely consider going to the circle as soon as possible."

I just shrugged and smiled weakly, "I'm not certain everyone at the tower can do what we did, Morrigan's incredibly powerful on her own and I've always had a way with spells."

"Even without your talents, each mage is essentially a siege weapon that's worth any regular group of men, if we'd had more at Ostagar things might have gone differently."

"But what about the dangers, I mean aren't you guys scared of me, I wiped out all those darkspawn like it was nothing" I brought my hand up and a small burst of flame puffed in my open palm. "Aren't either of you scared about this, I could become an abomination, or anything else could happen."

"Are you planning on turning on us Will?" Gareth said calmly looking down at me.

"Well…no its just, anyone else would be freaking out or trying to put limits on people like me or at least watching me or treating me differently or something, Alistair you're a former Templar, doesn't this raise any flags for you."

Alistair put a comforting arm on my shoulder and squeezed giving me a smile. "I won't lie, magic is a terrifying force, I'm a former Templar yes, but I'm a grey warden first, and so are you. We agreed at Ostagar, I won't lie I'm watching Morrigan closely, I don't trust her mother's reasons for making her come with us, but you've done nothing but serve proudly and help us whenever we needed it" The praise felt good, as well as the trust the man showed. "Duncan saw something in you, he wouldn't have recruited you otherwise, so we carry on as before, your my friend and I'm yours, at least as long as you don't turn me into a toad or become a bloodthirsty monster you'll have no problems from me."

"I think that can work Alistair thanks" Alistair nodded and began talking about what our plans should be, asking our opinions on where we should go first.

"I think that we should go to Arl Eamon first Gareth" Alistair said stubbornly.

"We can't be sure he'd listen to us Alistair, even if he does, I still feel we should at least check with some of the other factions. We'd present a much greater ally to him if we have some backing"

"The mages would be a good bet; however I'm not sure how receptive the Templars will be to my presence, let alone Morrigan" I responded remembering my treatment in the tower last time I was there, it would be nice to see it again, however if that meant going back in a small, dark cell then hell no.

**-Gareth Cousland- **

(Near dusk)

"I think we should set up camp for the night, we'll reach the town border tomorrow morning!" Alistair announced bringing the group to a halt. Soon enough within a few minutes we had a small fire going, with each of us spread out. Morrigan had gone off to the far edge of the road, choosing to sleep away from the main fire, setting up her own campsite. It also didn't help that the witch had the only bedroll and tent in her pack.

Will was sitting close to the fire with Drey and Nessa's new hound, eating some of the dried meat rations Morrigan had provided us with, he seemed to have a way with them. The rations weren't filling and Morrigan had been slightly less than forthcoming about what animal they had come from, but to be honest I'd had worse, Will however didn't look very happy. I remembered that this was probably the roughest he'd ever had to sleep being raised in the tower, little food, out in the cold; even the way to Ostagar with Duncan had horses and basic comforts. At least his coat seemed to keep him warm, and the rest of us had to make do with cloaks.

I was leaning against a tree adjusting and cleaning some of the pieces on my armor, maintaining equipment was important and it gave me time to think; I'd probably need to get it checked or replaced once we reached Lothering, many of the pieces were heavily dented from the ogre. I turned around after hearing the rattle of plate to see Alistair coming towards me, I groaned quietly and put down the armguard I had been fiddling with. I didn't feel like talking more about what we should do, the many had many ideas but even after hours of mostly one sided conversation we still had no clear direction.

"Gareth we have some things we should talk about, and before you ask it's not about what we are going to do after Lothering." Alistair started.

"Thank the Maker for that at least, You know the mage is a much better conversationalist then I am Alistair" I responded bringing out another scrap of armor and checking a particularly loose strap, Flemeth had manage to repair Wills coat and Nessa's armor however it seemed that plate was beyond her abilities.

"You know I've never seen a man go through as many suits of armor as you have." Alistair said picking up a loose shoulder plate and checking the scratches. "This was grey warden steel and you break it in less than a week."

"How many men do you know who have fought through hordes of darkspawn in crumbling decades old armor, been hit head on by an ogre, and taken a quarrel of arrows to the chest and stayed standing, don't blame me for having equipment issues in those kinds of situations, hell even I'm surprised I've lasted this long."

"No, I guess you're right there" The man laughed, this guy really was the opposite of Duncan in almost every way, "Anyway Gareth, I just wanted to say that I'm glad your adjusting so well to the warden lifestyle, it can be hard, especially for those with noble backgrounds, I was worried you'd have some trouble."

"It's not much of a change, I often went out on patrols in my father's lands dealing with bandits, I was head of my lands militia, and my father told me that the men respond better to someone who's not afraid to rough it alongside them rather than someone who sleeps in feathered beds."

"That's a surprisingly unconventional ideal for a noble to have, so that's why you were so used to taking command."

"I'm sorry it just seemed natural at the time, I can hold back if you'd prefer." I said dryly

"No, no" he said waving his hands at me, I turned to him eyebrow raised, "I'm glad, actually, I know I'm the senior warden and I've been getting ridden by Morrigan about it all day but I'm not a leader, the only reason I got us this far was because we've had clear objectives and Duncan." He paused a little after saying the name. " I'm a follower at heart Gareth; leading is not something I'm cut out for and I'm glad you can."

"So you want me lead our small group of misfits in a suicidal quest against all odds with only a small chance of success." I said sarcastically, the man had to be kidding.

"Hey at least with you leading it's a small chance" The man said getting up and looking down at me. "Just think about it okay, we need someone with your skills"

I grunted noncommittally and he walked off to go chat with Will, from what I could see of Alistair's face, it was clear they were talking about Duncan. I didn't want to deal with his death, the man had saved me and I would not forget his kindness not when so many others had fallen, just another name for the list, just another man to avenge. Was vengeance all I had left in life, was this all I had to look forward too.

I tried to focus on my repairs then when that didn't work, then I tried checking my weapons but both my sword and the dwarven axe were enchanted, they didn't need sharpening and blood seemed to literally fall off the blades, all I could do was clean a bit of blood off the handles. "Damn it" I sighed to myself slamming my head into my palms. I wasn't cut out to lead and strategize, that was Fergus' field of expertise, Fergus, I'd wanted to go out into the wilds and look for him but Alistair had talked me down, it was suicide to search him out. His group was in the wilds away from the battle, I could only hope they had escaped north when the battle was lost.

Fergus wouldn't die so easily, and if he was here we might actually have a shot; I could and had led small groups of men in the past yes, but recruiting an army and commanding it, that was foreign ground to me. The Maker definitely had a shit sense of humor, I'd already failed to protect my family, now I might just fail my country as well. I just dug my nails into my head all the tighter remembering the pained look on my father's face along with all of the others I'd let down, Oriana, Mother, Ser Gilmore, Oren.

"Gareth?" I turned around grabbing my sword at the sudden sound; it was half out of its scabbard when I realized it was just Nessa. The elf hadn't made a sound and that damn cloak of hers blended into the night so well, I hadn't heard so much as a leaf crack.

"Maker Nessa" I said exasperated, lowering my sword.

"I'm sorry I forget sometimes that you humans can't see or hear as well as elves." She said stepping over the roots to stand next to me hands raised.

"It's okay, I should have been paying more attention" Damn it my nerves must be more frayed than I thought. "So do you need anything?"

"No I just wanted to talk about how to care for Falon, you seem be experienced in this and I thought that you would be the best source of information."

"Falon, that means friend right? Fitting" I saw the flash of surprise that crossed her face and shrugged, "I grew up around elves, I picked some things up, anyway, the dog is likely well trained already if it was on a battlefield, you should really only need to learn the basic hand and vocal commands, from there they will understand pretty much any order you give him."

"So Will was right, the hounds do know what we say?" She said in a surprised voice.

"To a point yes, they were bred by mages in Tevinter to carry out small commands, then without any warning they all defected to Fereldan when Andraste invaded the imperium, if you believe that a dog species can defect of course."

"I don't know, it's kind of nice knowing that these dogs can choose their masters, I've heard tales of the imperium and their slave trade, if even dogs can understand that's wrong." She looked out at the dogs who at the moment were curled up around Will, apparently his coat gave off a good deal of heat that they enjoyed, "Why are they so attached to him I wonder."

"I don't know Nessa, I honestly don't know."

**-Nessa Mahariel- **

The morning had flown by quickly as we made took our first steps into Lothering, the hamlet was in worse straights then we thought, we'd managed to scare off some bandits set up outside the town's main road that were picking off deserters from the battle and secured what they stolen, Alistair was going to the local chantry, which appeared to be the acting town hall for the small community, to see if the items could be returned to their rightful owners. "It wouldn't hurt to get in good with whoevers in charge around here" Alistair had said.

Alistair had taken Will and Morrigan with him, leaving myself and Gareth to gather information and the dogs to guard the goods in case anyone else thought to take them. We had already found a blacksmith who was willing to by what scattered scraps remained of Gareth's armor for a pittance as he told us he'd be unable to repair it himself, he told us he had a spare set of reinforced plate that had been made for some mercenary but he hadn't had the means to pay, it seemed good quality and the man almost gave it to us after we told him we had driven off the bandits.

"So where do we go from here?" I asked feeling slightly uncomfortable, small towns had never been good to my people and some memories still cut deep. I was already getting some cutting glances from some of the town's people.

"The boy we helped told us that there was a tavern nearby, we should see about getting some shelter and pick up on gossip, and we can decide what to do then, hmm." He responded.

The tavern in question_, Dane's Refuge, _was a large building near the outskirts of the town and judging from the sounds within seemed full, a man saw we were about to enter and waved us down.

"Ho there friend, I wouldn't go in there right now, some men are tearing up the place, say there from the teyrn, they almost killed a man because the captain didn't like his face."

"Don't worry, we'll be fine, thanks for the warning however." Gareth said waving him away and turning to face me, "Loghain's men, we should go find Alistair and let him kno…" suddenly the tavern door exploded outward as a man flew from the entrance ending up sprawled on the ground bloody and groaning. The man started crawling towards us on all fours, coughing and wheezing, he was covered in cuts with a particularly nasty pair on his cheek, they looked like initials.

"Please, oh Maker, I didn't wha?" He took a good look at Gareth and then turned to me, his face paling, "Oh it's you the big one with the scar on his neck, and the dalish elf, it's you the Grey wardens from the camp, I don't care anymore, you gotta help me, please get rid of him, he's not human!"

Suddenly a clear whistling sound started playing from inside the tavern causing the man to look back in fear as a figure in leather breeches and a cotton shirt and thick hardened leather jacket stepped out through the broken hole and into the light twirling a curved dagger in his hand, "Come on, are you done already? You were talking up a storm in the tavern throwing your weight around; you have to apologize to some people." He tossed his knife into his free hand and started ticking off fingers, "Barlin, whose tavern you were disrupting and who you owe a door to now, Peaches, a personal friend of my brother who told me that you're men were groping her, it's quite a list."

The man on the ground was crying now, actually crying, meanwhile all I could do was stare at the oncoming assailant's face. He was for the most part an older version of Will with slightly longer wilder hair and a goatee slapped on. The eyes and the smile however were unmistakable.

The man stopped and pointed his knife at me and Gareth in turn then to the sobbing man who was at the moment trying to hid behind Gareth's leg. "Is he a friend of yours?"

Gareth shook his head and kicked the man off of him; the man was sprawled in the dirt. "Please Wardens, this man's crazy please!"

"Wardens?" the man paused looking back at us when a pretty red haired woman in bloody chantry robes stumbled out of the tavern and pushed him away from the one on the ground.

"Please, stop, ser, he's given up, he clearly can no longer defend himself." The woman said in a foreign accent.

"Miss, please this man was going to do you harm if I hadn't stepped in, this man has also hurt friends of mine so forgive me if I just want to make sure he and his men pay for it."

"His men have already paid enough as has this man, it's okay, we should all just calm down now." The woman looked towards us to help, Gareth seemed disinclined but from what I could see the man on the ground had had enough, you don't torture a wounded animal. I stepped to the woman's side, she looked at me gratefully. The man glared at me and then at Gareth then smiled slightly.

"Okay, Okay," The man held his hands up in mock surrender, knife loose in his grasp, "I'll let him off sister, I'd rather not push the issue anyway, with the wardens here"

"Brother!" a voice rang out from behind us, I turned to see a younger muscle-bound man sprint down the street a large sword slung across his back, judging from his statement as well as the color of his hair and eyes, the two men must be related.

"Ah Carver, you missed all the fun" The man stated walking up to the young man, "Where have you been."

Carver just looked down at the man and then at the tavern, "Jon, you didn't, tell me you didn't, we have enough problems with the darkspawn without you bringing the chantry down on us."

"The man shook his head and patted his brother on the shoulder, "I swear I dealt with them the old fashioned way." he waved his dagger in his brother's face, "Nothing that they could sense anyway, we're fine, have you gotten mother and Bethany packing, I'd like to be out of the city by tomorrow."

"Their fine, now come on we need to go, sorry sister, sorry wardens, I wish we had more time to get to know each other but I'm certain you of all people know about what's coming." He waved before getting dragged off by his brother; a crowd had begun to gather around the commotion.

"Thank you, thank you, thank you" the man said groveling into the sister's robes, she was patting his back.

"Don't thank me, I doubt I could have done much to stop him, thank these wardens." The man looked at us, stood up and bowed his head looking shaky on his feet.

"My gratitude wardens, I cannot forgive your order's betrayal of the king, but thank you for saving me from that mad man nonetheless."

"What do you mean, the wardens didn't betray the king, Lohgain took his army away from the battle and left the king and the army to die!" Gareth growled at the man, causing him to flinch.

"The grey wardens led the king into a trap, the teyrn could do nothing!" he shouted, I just shook my head and grabbed the man by his chest plate.

"It doesn't matter shem; get yourself patched up and bring a message to Lohgain, the gray wardens know what really happened at Ostagar"

The man looked as if he might argue further but an angry glance shut him up, he simply nodded and started running.

"Thank you for sparing that man, if you'd seen what that man did to the others" the woman shuddered lightly. "Anyway I am Leliana, lay sister of the lothering chantry in service to the Maker."

"We had no reason to kill him sister Leliana, killing defenseless men isn't what grey wardens do, at least for the most part. Now if you excuse us we'll be on our way" Gareth made to leave and I to follow when the woman grabbed my arm.

"Wait, he said you were both grey wardens did he not, please hear me out. I wish to join you wherever you go."

Gareth and I both turned our heads at that.

-END

**A/N: Alright everyone we are in Lothering, next chapter, our favorite qunari is introduced. We also got to see the Hawke brothers. Thank you all for reading, I am likely going to aim for weekend releases now, things are getting a little hectic at the moment, but the ideas are still flowing. Your reviews and feedback are all very much appreciated.**

**I also really liked this armor in DA2 so I thought I'd bring it in.**

**Gareth's Armor**

** wiki/Mercenary%27s_Reinforced_Plate**


	10. Chapter 10

**COMRADES**

**-Alistair-**

"I still don't see why we're making such an effort carrying that useless trash around," Morrigan stated off hand as we neared the chantry, pointing to the sack on mine and Will's backs "We should simply sell them and be done with it".

The building itself was unmistakable, being the largest in the settlement, with the Andraste's symbol displayed proudly, or at least it should have been. The building had clearly suffered through all of the chaos, with signs of disrepair and lack of proper care evident everywhere, though I supposed the Templars had bigger things to worry about with the horde on the way than maintaining flower gardens and patching up holes.

"We're doing it because it's the right thing to do, these people were robbed and need any help they can, plus we need whatever help and information they are willing to provide." I shot back, damn witch, little over one day with her and I already was tired of her company.

If I'd wanted to have my intelligence or my resolve and basically every other quality I possessed insulted every second of my life I would have stayed in the Chantry and probably have ended up like one of these Templars. Looking over at the blonde one who was watching the buildings entrance, back straight, eyes focused on us in an icy stare watching for any sign of wrongdoing, and that's one without the stuffy conical great helm, I shuddered. You know what Morrigan might be a bitch but at least I had the freedom to let her know it without praying for the Maker's forgiveness.

"I don't see why you're Morrigan, you don't have to carry one of these things" I grunted hefting the heavy pack higher on my shoulder,

"I did not see any reason why I should strain myself to return useless trinkets back to those who were too weak or too stupid to keep them in the first place." She responded indifferently.

"Come on you too we're being allowed inside" Will interjected, pointing to the now opening door, "We're supposed to talk to Ser Bryant, apparently he's in charge of most of the day to day administration now that the Bann's left to join up with Lohgain."

As we entered the chantry interior however I sighed, if the outside was looking haggard, the inside was a disaster with shouting crowds of refugees lining up, milling about, or praying desperately. Crates and boxes dominated the space as chantry priests tried to distribute food and alms. Children ran throughout the chaos between the legs of their elders. Hearing a loud crash I turned to see a large man towering over a small quivering initiate shouting about the lack of food. I made to go break up the situation but Will held me back, shaking his head. Soon enough the man was grabbed and hauled out of the room by some Templars who seemed to appear from out of nowhere.

"Maker I had no idea things were this bad." Will muttered looking off in the direction the Templars had dragged the man.

I just nodded and motioned for us to continue forward through the throng of people. "Yes, and they'll get worse before this is over, if we fail to stop the horde all of Fereldan will look like this, if there's even a Fereldan left at that point."

Soon enough we managed to reach a small office space where a dark skinned man stood behind a desk littered in scrolls and notices talking to a group of Templars milling about the room. "and I've heard of darkspawn stragglers breaking off from the rest of the horde, with the banns forces gone we Templars are the only hope of protection this village has now and I will not abandon it, that is all, may the Maker have mercy on us" As the knights left the room the man seemed to crumple in his chair hand on his forehead. When he saw us however he shook himself aware and got up to greet us offering a hand which I took, "Ah, you must be the group that dealt with the bandits, I am Ser Bryant, commander of the Templars stationed here in Lothering. A squire informed me you were coming, thank you, the bandits were a nuisance but we just couldn't seem to spare the manpower to deal with them."

"Yes, that's actually why we're here in fact, we have some of the possessions that the bandits had taken from refugees" Me and Will hefted the packs off and placed them against the wall of the room, "The rest is still on the hill be watched by guard dogs, they will respond to our presence so make sure to take one of us along if you wish to retrieve them."

The man nodded approvingly at us and sized up the sacks, "Yes, thank you, it's good to see some charity in these trying times." I shot a smile at Morrigan who just grunted, "We will make every effort to return what possessions we can, but as you can see, things are quite hectic at the moment." A tired look of concern crossed his face as he spoke. "Forgive me but I must ask were you survivors of the battle, you don't seem like the other refugees that have passed through here, I'd say you were one of Arl Eamon's knights but somehow the presence of two mages seems to discount that idea."

Will gave an audible groan while Morrigan bared her teeth eyes flashing. Will stepped forward, "How do you know we're mages ser?"

Ser Bryant shrugged, "I'd be a poor Templar if I couldn't detect the presence of two mages who got this close to me, plus," he motioned to the staff slung across Will's shoulder, "If you want to fool anyone into believing that's a walking stick you should at least cover the runes."

I moved fast to diffuse the situation. "You're correct ser, my companions and I are Grey Wardens seeking supplies and information, anything you can provide will be welcome."

The man leaned forward, eyes never leaving Morrigan or Will, "Both of them are Grey Wardens?"

Morrigan made to say otherwise but I headed her off, "Yes, ser both are Wardens and thus outside of Chantry jurisdiction."

The man simply held up his arms "That's good to hear, don't worry I don't want to tangle with the wardens, plus it's not like I'd be able to hold you. I'm more concerned with the fact that you are Grey Wardens, Teyrn Lohgain has declared any surviving Grey Wardens traitors, responsible for King Cailan's death, you know this I hope?"

"The Grey Wardens did no such thing, the Teyrn is lying." I said with maybe more force then I'd intended, it was one thing to betray the entire army and get Duncan and the rest of the Wardens killed, but to place the blame upon them, to know that Duncan's memory and sacrifice was being vilified, Lohgain would pay for this.

"I don't believe the Grey Wardens would be as careless or malicious as the Teyrn claims, but either way there it is, it's best you don't linger though."

"Thank you for understanding at least Ser Bryant, we will endeavor not to cause you too much trouble and will be on our way when our supplies are replenished." I stated respectfully, I then remembered the locket hanging from my belt and looked up, "Also, is there a Sir Henric here? He's one of Arl Eamon's knights and an old friend; I have something here for him."

"Yes there is a man by that name exploring our library at the moment, seeking information about the urn of sacred ashes, something about it curing the Arl, men can help you find him as well as arrange some supplies, it's the least we can do but given the current state of things here it'll have to be enough."

"Thank you Ser, you've helped us a great deal more than we had any right to expect" I shook the man's hand one more time before leaving the room, chances are I'd never see him alive again

**-William Amell-**

"Is that man always such a fool when it comes to wasting time?" Morrigan asked from her perch on the bench. It had been several minutes since Alistair had gone off to talk with whoever this Sir Henric was and deal with the new supplies, leaving me with Morrigan to watch the chaos from a wooden bench near the altar. In the time we'd been talking, I'd already learned three things about our new traveling companion, she had never spent any extended time out of the wilds where she'd grown up much like my time in the tower, she strongly disliked Alistair and from what I could see the feeling was definitely mutual, and she had serious mother issues.

"He's not so bad, for a Templar he's actually quite decent, his jokes need work and he's a little obsessed with cheese but hey nobody's perfect." I said shrugging.

She just looked at me and sighed heavily, shaking her head, I continued on. "He probably saved your life back there you know, when the Templar said he'd known what we are, if he hadn't talked him down we'd be goners."

"Doubtful, we would be able to escape certainly, the Templars here would not have been able to keep the two of us contained, I didn't need your blonde oaf making up stories on my behalf, tis not a shame to be proud of your freedom." She countered glaring at me,

"Someone's never been hit by a smite before I see, let me fill you in then, Templars talk big because they can back it up, if we made trouble and he took away our magic we'd be practically defenseless against their swords, plus being a warden is immunity. If you're an apostate, any Templar would be well within his rights to attempt to arrest you at any time, as a warden you're untouchable, well to an extent at least," I stood up and walked in front of her arms outstretched, "Imagine walking down a street without the Templars dogging you're steps, it's like being normal."

As I turned around and looked at her face I noticed, a new emotion crossing her eyes, pity? "Do you truly hate your gift that much William?" she stated frankly.

I looked down and pulled out a small golden locket with a crest adorning its face from beneath my shirt, I would have kept it in a pocket but I felt it wasn't worth the risk that I might lose it, pockets, it felt great to be out of those robes. I held up the locket and opened it to show a portrait of a smiling woman.

"A pretty woman, judging by her looks I guess she's related to you?" the witch asked turning the locket in her hands.

"This is my mother Revka Amell, she was a noble born in the city of Kirkwall, who married a rich man, and together they had me along with my baby brother. One day a short while after I'd just turned seven years old, I found out I can do things, light candles when I wanted to stay up late, bring things towards me without touching them. Of course I showed my mother who was horrified; turns out she'd been afraid of this since magic had run deep in her line. She tried to get me to hide it, but I was young and foolish and soon my father found out what I was."

Morrigan nodded signaling that I could continue.

"My father wasn't a kind man, he wasn't happy finding out his eldest son could use magic, he wanted me gone so I wouldn't end up shaming the household name. That bastard had me tied up, gagged, and then shoved me into a small, dark chest for the 2 days it took to get the Templars to come collect me." I shuddered at the memory still vivid after all these years, the dark. "My mother was forbidden to see me; the last memory of my little brother is him shouting that I was a monster when the Templars dragged me away."

"Rather cruel, to shove so young a boy in a box and turn his family against him." Morrigan remarked, I just nodded darkly.

"My little brother was always an impressionable one; his hate was just a reflection of my father's, jokes on that bastard though. Turns out my brother was found to be a mage as well when he got older, I also apparently have two sisters as well with the gift, never met them though. Father must have been so furious." There had been a period a few years back when I had tried to get into contact with my siblings, they'd still be apprentices, however no one would tell me which circle they had been sent too, family ties weren't very well encouraged in the circle. "The only reason I'm here in Fereldan to be honest is that when I said my father wanted me gone, he meant gone, as in across an ocean never to be heard from again."

"Then where did you come by this?" Morrigan asked passing the small trinket back to me, I stared down and smiled before returning it to its place around my neck.

"She got one of the Templars escorting me to pass it on; I think she knew my father wouldn't be content with me in the Kirkwall circle."

"One of those overzealous mage hunters gave it to you; I would have thought their order forbade giving mementos to mage children." Morrigan asked giving me a quizzical look.

"Apparently this one was one of the good ones, or she bribed him; anyway you asked me if I hated my magic, I don't think I do. I can do amazing things with it that no one else can, things most people can only dream of doing." I could almost hear Mouse cackling in the back of my head at how boastful that statement sounded, well it was the truth, "Magic is a part of who I am, I'm skilled in its use and it now serves me in what I must accomplish."

"But you fear it?" the witch asked quizzically "You fear the abilities fate has granted you, abilities that set you above most men; I saw it in your eyes after our battle with the darkspawn?"

"I don't fear it, not really, I suppose I respect that magic is a powerful and dangerous force, I'm not saying I agree with the Templars about me needing to be in a circle, but if you saw the way people looked at me when we were traveling to the tower, a small, ragged looking boy surrounded by Templars, they knew what I was and they feared me." I remembered the last weeks of my freedom moving from village to village in a strange cold land, how the townspeople looked when they saw me, how children threw rocks at me as we passed by.

"Weak people fearing a power that they refuse to even attempt to understand despite it existing all around them, religious zealots who preach the words of a mad woman long since dead, why must I be caged like an animal, shut away from the world's wonders, to satisfy wretches such as them." She stated an air of defiance and a shine in her strange yellow eyes which disturbingly reminded me of Rayya, oh yeah, If we had to go to the tower to recruit the mages I'd have to see her again. I sighed, cross that bridge when you come to it Will. I held up a hand to stop her tirade.

"I agree with you, the system needs work, I just know that if I wanted too, I could burn this room right now, that option exists even though I choose not to take it, sadly that's the assumption people make of me when they learn what I am, believe me I'd change it if I could." I stated casually before moving to sit down beside her again. We spent the next uncomfortable few minutes in silence before Morrigan spoke up suddenly.

"Thank you for sharing your tale with me, for what it is worth I am sorry you suffered so, it sounds unpleasent."

I just looked back at her and smiled "Thanks, I haven't told a lot of people that story, only two other people know that, well one now I suppose," I pushed down my sadness, I would grieve for Wynne in time, but later, not now. "So how about your childhood, growing up in a hut with a legendary mad swamp witch, not many people can say that." Morrigan gave a short laugh.

"My time in the wilds was…"

**-Gareth Cousland-**

By the Maker, this woman would not stop talking. I'd tried to convince her to stay in Lothering and help the people here, but the red haired priest seemed convinced that Maker had shown her a sign, and she was meant to help defeat the blight. We weren't able to give a reason for not taking her, she offered us rooms in the chantry, citing that the other inns were full, the Dane's Refuge would be taking no more customers in for a while after what had happened within. Whoever that man had been, he hadn't been kind to the other men inside, most were covered in vicious slash marks, while others sported twisted or broken limbs.

The woman in question, Leliana, was currently walking ahead of us on our way back to the chantry, pointing out different landmarks and talking up a storm about her experiences as a lay sister in the city. Nessa was walking next to me watching the woman closely with a suspicious look on her face.

"Is this okay Gareth? I'm not certain she's stable" Nessa whispered when the women was out of earshot talking to an elderly woman.

"I really don't know, she appears alright and the townspeople seem to know her well so I doubt she's dangerous, plus we need the help." I responded watching her hold up a small child that had been hiding behind the woman, a smile on her face.

The elf scowled at me, "I didn't think we were desperate enough to recruit someone who has visions of her god talking to her."

"We don't exactly have the luxury of turning down help, not now anyway; if she can handle herself then she's welcome. It's not as if she'll be the most interesting stray we've picked up, just the most talkative.

"I'm just worried, she said she had visions."

"Do the Dalish not have spiritual prophets or visions to communicate with their gods?" I asked, I had heard that the Dalish praised a group of gods known as the Creators, growing up around elves did not mean I knew all of their culture however.

"We see signs of our gods in the world around us but they do not interact with us in our mortal form" Nessa traced her hand along the edge of her facial tattoo. "We honor our gods through our markings and remember them, however I was under the impression your Maker had turned from the world, am I wrong?"

"No your correct I believe, the chantry teaches that the Maker's turned from the world, twice in fact. Though I suppose she doesn't believe that's the case." I pointed at the priests back. I thought back to the lessons Mallol had tried to give me after chantry services and holidays, "If you want specifics talk to Alistair, I'm not particularly religious, despite my mother's best efforts."

"You don't believe in your god?" she asked quizzically

"No, the Maker just doesn't have any real meaning to me at the moment, prayer never appealed to me, and I never put much stock in faith."

Suddenly Leliana stopped in the middle of the road looking off to the side of the street. We turned to see a large wrought iron cage rising out of a small patch of earth, inside was a figure hunched down, chanting in a strange language I couldn't understand.

"What's wrong?" I asked walking up to her.

"I'm sorry, it's just that its rather sad, I don't like the thought of anyone being left to the darkspawn, even a qunari murderer."

"Qunari?" Nessa looked at the figure more carefully, right, she'd spent the majority of her life with her clan, who likely had little interaction with the horned men, wait, horns?

"The Qunari represent the Qun, one of the most widely feared movements in the world. They appeared from somewhere across the ocean hundreds of years ago and took an island called Par Vollen, highly militaristic, they spread and conquered a good deal of land before the Llomerryn accord was signed to push them back." I examined the creature more closely. "I was under the impression that they had horns however, are you sure he's qunari?"

Leliana nodded "That's what he told the Templars when they captured him; he murdered an entire family at one of the outlying farms, even the children." I strode up to the cage, the qunari had pale grey skin and white hair styled in braided dreadlocks, he looked up at my approach with violet colored eyes.

"You are not one of my captors; I will not amuse you or any of the other humans leave me in peace." The creature stated in a deep monotone voice.

"Pardon, but I'm told you are one of the Qunari, I haven't seen many of your kind before, only the occasional hired bodyguard or bandit." I replied calmly, this was a stupid plan, but if it worked out.

The crouched figure stood up causing me to step back a little, by the maker he must be nearly 7 feet tall and bursting with muscle. I wasn't used to talking up to someone, usually people did that to me. "You have never met any qunari before today if those are your examples, I am Sten of the Berasaad, vanguard of the Qunari peoples." The creature, sten stated, slightly more forcefully then before.

"I am Gareth Cousland of Highever, greetings" I said respectfully bowing my head. Nessa and Leliana looked to each other before bowing their heads as well.

The qunari looked at me in surprise, "You mock me, or you show manners I've not come to expect in your lands, though it matters little now, I will die soon enough, I suggest you leave me to my fate."

"I have an offer Sten, I find myself in need of skilled help." This was the important part.

"No doubt, what sort of help do you seek?" The creature shot back, arms folded.

"I am sworn protect this land from the blight and the darkspawn horde, the one approaching this very town."

"The Blight? Are you a grey warden then?" Sten asked now fully focused on me.

"Yes I am as is my comrade here" I said pointing out Nessa, she still seemed shocked by his size.

"Hmm… My people have heard legends of the Grey Wardens strength and skill, although I suppose not every legend is true." I grit my teeth at the remark but took a deep breath and continued on.

"I am offering you a chance to join us in saving the land from the blight, I grew up hearing stories about the Qunari's skill in battle. You'll be a boon to our cause if even half of what I've heard is true." Nessa looked at me questioningly and Leliana seemed nervous. I turned to face the sister.

"Leliana is there a way I can get Sten free, who can I talk to?" the sister shot the giant a glance and nodded her head.

"I suppose you can go to the revered mother and explain the situation to her, I doubt she'll turn you down if you tell her who you are and it is a special circumstance." I nodded and turned back to the giant.

"Would that be agreeable, Sten, if I can get the key to your cage, you will fight alongside us against the horde?" The giant nodded solemnly. I bowed my head back and turned to walk away, Nessa ran up next to me an annoyed look on her face.

"So we are literally taking anyone remotely useful along with us now are we? Even murderers, what if he attacks us after we set him free, he's gigantic, much bigger then you?" she asked trying to get in front of me, I just kept walking on pushing past her.

"He seems trustworthy and we do need the help, I don't know about this murder business but Duncan was saying the Grey Wardens have taken worse. Either way if we get him free he'll be my responsibility, if a problem comes up I'll deal with it." I said as the chantry came into view. She just grunted in response and walked hung back talking to Leliana, I sighed, well Alistair wanted you in charge and you were making a command decision, we needed more people. I was unsure about Leliana, but Sten certainly would be a horror if he worked out. He had a dangerous air of contained violence about him that I'd learned to feel during my time in tourney melees, the feel of a veteran fighter who has fought on multiple occasions.

Leliana ran up ahead to talk to a Templar on our behalf and he soon led us into the main hall, I saw Will off to the side talking to Morrigan her, he seemed disturbed by whatever the witch was saying, his face pale.

I caught the sister by the arm as we made our way over, "Leliana, where is the revered mother? I want to deal with this qunari issue as soon as possible."

"If she is not preaching to the people she is likely in her study, down the hall and to the right."

I released her arm and began walking down the hall through the crowds of people. I might as well get this over with quickly.

**-Nessa Mahariel- **

"Idiotic shem" I found myself muttering, watching Gareth retreat into the crowd. I found myself uncomfortable in this building, too many people in such a small space, I noticed a few ragged looking elves staring at me, the flat ears from the city often.

We approached the two mages working our way past a bread line, Will walked up to greet me while staring quizzically at the red haired sister.

"Hey Nessa, I thought I saw you all come in, hello miss," he turned bowing to Leliana, who was looking at him with a hint of fear in her eyes which Will picked up on, he backed up with his hands held to the side, "Oh umm… sorry did I do something to offend."

"Oh no no, forgive me it's just…" She shook her head and placed a hand to her chest, curtsying gracefully, "I am Leliana, I am a lay sister for the chantry here, I was told I could accompany you on your quest to defeat the blight, I met Nessa and Gareth at the inn and offered my services, I've also set up rooms here for you all to use.."

"Oh excellent, another companion, and a sister at that, oh joy." Morrigan stated from the bench eyes flashing.

"Don't mind her, hello Leliana, I am William Amell but friends just call me Will, glad to have you with us." The mage said energetically before turning to me and pointing in the direction Gareth walked, "Where is Gareth off too, he seemed preoccupied?"

I shrugged and sat myself down on the bench, "He's off trying to negotiate the freedom of our other companion, a murdering giant named Sten who killed a whole family,"

"Wait what?" He said dumbstruck, Leliana went to lean against the wall.

"He was captured about a week ago before all of the troubles with the darkspawn; farmers sent word they found a large man in the woods, Ser Bryant sent his Templars to the house and they found this Sten standing in the middle of a massacre, just standing there, he surrendered without a fight. The Revered Mother didn't want to execute him in case it causes trouble with the Qunari so she placed him in a cage, and refused him meals."

Morrigan shook her head and placed a hand over her face, "And he is actively trying to recruit this monster to travel with us? Is he touched in the head?"

I took out a piece of the rough meet and began chewing, it was rough and tasteless but it allowed me to focus on something. "I don't know, he believes that he'll be able to help at least. He might even want to recruit that strange man from the inn."

"What man, there was someone at the inn?" Will asked looking from me to Leliana.

Leliana's face paled and she began scratching at her arm, "Yes, some of Teyrn Lohgain's men were making trouble at the inn, searching for Grey Wardens and throwing their weight around, then this man walked up to them alone and began taunting them, I tried to intervene but the Teyrn's men just grouped me together with him and attacked me, then suddenly the man was just taking them apart, all he had was a knife, they couldn't touch him and he was laughing, just laughing." She shook slightly, I saw the aftermath of what had happened and it chilled me, to have actually seen what happened.

"He actually looked a lot like you Will, we managed to stop him from doing any more damage, and he left soon after with his brother."

"Wait he looked like me, did you get a name or anything like that?"

Leliana nodded, "Yes the townspeople seemed to know him or at least of him, his name is Jon, I recognized his brother Carver Hawke from some of the prayer services and holidays when he did some jobs for the Chanter's board, they are a nice family, but I was under the impression it was just Carver, his sister Bethany, and their mother Leandra. That someone like that could be related to them…"

Will's eyes shot up at the mention of the name and he walked up to the sister, "Hawke, it was definitely Hawke?" Leliana nodded and he stepped back hand on his chin thinking, "I think I might know them, before the circle took me in, I had an Aunt Leandra, she eloped with an Apostate and their child a few years before I was born, big scandal in my family. She and my mother were very close, they live here?"

"Yes, near the edge of town, I can take you to them after I pick up my supplies, but we should really be careful, that man wasn't stable, he's dangerous." She then wandered up the stairs with Morrigan close behind, who was muttering something about needing bath; did they even have baths in the wilds?

"Nessa, Will!" A shout rang out over the chaos from the direction of the main staircase, Alistair came jogging up a serious look on his face, "Good thing I found you, I was talking with Sir Henric one of Arl Eamon's knights, turns out there may be some problems with asking for his help, he looked around suddenly, "Wait where's Morrigan, wasn't she here with you?"

"We'll explain on the way Alistair, we have some news as well for you to digest, Morrigan is in our new rooms taking a bath, Leliana, a sister we found who wants to join us should be back soon to lead us to someone who may be Will's insane cousin, and Gareth is currently negotiating over the release of a Qunari murderer with the revered mother." I stated calmly.

Alistair just stared at me and laughed.

-END

A/N: All right everyone we've reached the 10 chapters mark, we almost have everything wrapped up in Lothering, I am still debating where to go first but I'm glad everything seems to be going so smoothly. Thank you all for reading this far and for your comments, it is very much appreciated.


	11. Chapter 11

**ESCAPE**

**-Gareth Cousland-**

"Gareth we really need to talk about this decision of yours." Alistair remarked trying to keep up with my long strides. I just tried to tune him out; the heavy pack slung over my shoulder was heavy enough and it had been a long day.

"Gareth listen this might seem like a good idea to you, the qunari are renowned warriors, but I'm seeing some flaws with just letting this "Sten" come with us simply because we're short on assistance, do you really want him coming with us, the people around here are pretty set on leaving him to the darkspawn."

I looked over my shoulder at the blonde warden glaring, "You're the one who wanted me to lead, well this is leading, we had a problem with numbers, and now I'm fixing it. Besides…" I pointed back in the direction of the chantry, "You don't seem to be complaining all that much about Leliana."

"Just because I don't complain about her doesn't mean I trust her, Nessa's right you know, I get the feeling she's not being completely straight with us." He shrugged, "Plus I didn't hear five eyewitnesses claiming they found her in a house surrounded by bodies and covered in blood which is more than I can say for this new prospect."

"Your right Alistair, her talking to the Maker himself and spouting off about visions and purpose is much less unsettling." I said in a mocking voice.

"Point taken" Alistair muttered, we continued on in silence but soon the former Templar broke the silence yet again. "Do you think there's anything to her visions, about the blight I mean?"

"She seems to believe in them if nothing else; I don't see how it matters either way in the long run." I replied

Alistair lowered his eyes thoughtfully, "It would be nice to have someone on our side, you know."

I sighed and shook my head, we were quickly approaching the cage, the giant inside on his knees, head bowed, chanting in that strange language. He stopped and stared at me as I put down the sack I was carrying with a heavy thud.

"I'll admit, I did not believe you would return human." The giant said slowly.

I tapped the large sack with my foot and pulled a key from my belt, "It was a challenge, the revered mothers a greedy bitch, but I have the key to your cell, as well as the supplies you had on you when you were taken by the Templars."

"Was their perhaps a sword among the supplies?" The giant remarked, a hint of desperation in his voice.

"No the Templars said you were unarmed, why? Did you have a sword with you?" Alistair asked.

The giant lowered his head before turning his gaze back to me, "It does not matter now, I will need a weapon if I am to accompany you, or if you wish I can use my fists, though my usefulness in combat will be diminished, Set me free and I will follow you against the blight."

"Very well," I moved open the cage, this giant was crazy; he actually seemed ready to fight darkspawn barehanded, though considering his size and the size of his arms that may actually have been an option.

As I stepped back opening the cage the Qunari stepped out stretching to his full height.

"Maker" Alistair swore as he took a step back, I understood the feeling, even in rags the Qunari was easily more than a head taller than me, Nessa would look like a child. No wonder the world was terrified of these things.

"And so it is done" The giant stated in his monotone voice, "I will follow you into battle, and in doing so find my atonement."

"And if following me does not lead to this atonement?" I asked hesitantly

"Then I will leave; now let us proceed, I am eager to take my leave of this place." I nodded at him and motioned for both he and Alistair to follow.

"We are going to the blacksmith to get you a weapon, and then we will need to spend a night in the chantry." I heard the giant stop behind me, I turned to find him staring at me, "Is there a problem Sten?"

"You need not bother with my weapon I will procure one, I will also decline staying in that building, I will not be welcomed and I can do more on my own." The giant stated walking towards the outskirts of the township.

Alistair made to follow him but I held him back, "Sten, we will likely move for the main imperial highway if we are forced to leave, you can meet us there."

"The Giant turned and saluted me before breaking into a run, soon leaving our sight, though the startled yells of the townspeople made it clear where he was heading.

"Was that wise Gareth, letting him go off like that?" Alistair asked looking at me with a worried expression on his face.

I didn't answer

**-William Amell-**

"So the Hawke family really lives out here?" I asked Leliana as our small group consisting of Nessa, me and herself, Morrigan refusing to leave the comforts of the Chantry, passed by another small farm. I had difficulty imagining any noble going from the grandeur of rich manses and social life to living by the outskirts on some farm in a tiny hamlet like Lothering, not that Lothering seemed a bad place to live, but strange nonetheless.

"Yes, it should not much further now, just up ahead." The red headed sister replied. I still didn't know what to think of her, or her visions about helping us, Nessa kept staring daggers at her back suspecting an attack or a trap at any moment, I just settled for keeping my staff ready just in case. "So Will…" Leliana called back from her place up front, startling me, "you truly believe that the Hawkes are family relations?"

"Yes, well they may be, I had an Aunt Leandra though we never met, and you did say I looked like that one Hawke brother so it seems likely." I felt out my amulet under my shirt and gripped it, Morrigan had spun my Wardens oath and the locket together on the same chain and I was still getting used to the extra weight pulling at me.

Nessa spoke up forcefully from my side, "You said you knew Leandra and the Hawkes, Leliana, what are they like?" Leliana didn't seem at all affected by Nessa's tone.

"Well I've only ever spoken with Leandra personally, she is a kind woman and not one person in the town has ever spoken anything too bad about her. It seems her husband died shortly before I arrived here and she has sought solace in the Maker and in her children ever since."

"And her children?" I asked hesitantly, I was getting a bit nervous now at the prospect of meeting family. The last time I'd even been near someone related to me was my father and that was because he wanted one last chance to spit on me before I left, Leandra had married an apostate though if the stories were true so she couldn't hate mages too badly. "What about them?"

"Well I was only aware of two before today, twins, though it seems now there are three, Carver does jobs on the Chanters board to get coin and prestige, the girl Bethany sometimes comes by when I do services around the city, both of them seem like fine young people."

"But there's a third one, this Jon, you've never heard anything about him?"

"No, it seems he left the town soon after their father's death, it was very sudden, I had to ask some of the chantry seniors and Elder Miriam just to learn that much." She cringed a little but shook it off. "I would have never thought a man like that could have something to do with the Hawkes."

Nessa nodded darkly, whatever had happened at the Dane's Refuge was obviously still on both of their minds, I hadn't seen any of the damage myself, Nessa had only compared it to the aftermath of a great storm with broken furniture and bodies everywhere. I had seen some of the surviving men they brought back to the chantry however; each looked as if an animal had mauled them, they also weren't making much sense, many just babbling and crying.

"Here we are." Leliana announced suddenly pointing at a moderately sized home up ahead, steeling myself I quickly moved forward along the beaten path up to the front door and knocked three times.

Soon enough a kind looking elderly woman opened the door shouting at someone down the hallway inside. I was shocked, I didn't have many memories of my mother but I was sure this is what she would have looked like at this age. "I don't care, take only what you can carry, now I'm sorry who…" she gave a start as she saw me, eyes narrowing, "Jon? How did…what happened to you."

"I…what?" I managed to stutter before she grabbed my face. "Ahh, miss Leandra, I think you're making a mistake."

A pretty black haired girl came into the hallway and saw us, eyes widening, "Mother! What are you doing!" That must be Bethany, the younger sister then.

Leandra pulled back and turned bright red, "Oh I'm sorry young man I just, you look so much like, never mind, forgive me."

I waved away her apology "No, no it's okay, It's okay, no harm done." Leliana and Nessa were just hanging back with surprised looks on their faces.

"Ahh sister Leliana, I'm sorry, you should have sent word you were coming, things are a little hectic, we're packing for the road. We hope to leave tomorrow, did you want something?

Leliana shook her head and gestured to me, "Actually I was just coming by to introduce this young man to you."

I bowed my head, "Hello Leandra Hawke, my name is William Amell, my mother was Revka Amell, she always spoke highly of you even after, well."

"Well that certainly would explain the resemblance at least, people did always say Revka and I were almost twins, forgive me child, you look just like my eldest Jon around the time he left, after Malcolm passed I mean. I thought he was playing a trick, anyway what kind of meeting is this on a doorstep, come in, your companions too." She eyed Nessa a little too carefully as we stepped inside but compared to me and Leliana, Nessa did seem a lot more threatening with her armor and bow slung over her shoulder. She brought us into a small sitting room next to a stone fireplace; the house was cozy with a sort of rustic feel to it.

"So since your hear I'll assume you were taken by the circle at some point, I don't see a Free Marches nobleman coming out here." Leandra stated sitting down in a plush chair and offering us seats, Nessa moved to the corner of the room. "You're a mage aren't you?"

"Yes" I answered holding my hand up, a small flame appeared floating in my open palm. Leandra merely nodded her head, not the reaction I was expecting, and most people were frightened of that little trick. Bethany held out her own hand and produced a blue aura, she smiled at me.

"We're in the same boat, cousin, don't worry our family is no stranger to magic." She said comfortingly. So what brings you out of the tower, are you an apostate too?"

I shook my head, "No, actually it is a bit of a story actually, suffice it to say I'm actually a Grey Warden, Nessa is as well" I gestured at the blonde elf. "Sister Leliana has agreed to help us."

Bethany then looked at Leliana, an apologetic look on her face, "I'm sorry sister, I know this is a shock."

The red haired sister shook her head quickly, "No not at all, I understand, the Templars would not have been very forgiving, and traveling with the grey wardens requires an open mind."

Leandra still looked at me with a shocked look on her face "The Grey Wardens, so some did survive Ostagar, Carver was right then, he said that the Teyrns men were all liars." She looked at us inquisitively, "They are lying yes, and your order didn't have anything to do with the king's death?"

"No, Lohgain is lying to the country, blaming the wardens, he left the field and abandoned us all, the king and his army along with the rest of the wardens aside from two others besides us fell, we almost fell as well if not for lucky circumstance on our part."

I must have looked pained, Leliana tried to steer the conversation in a new direction, "So, Leandra, Will tells me your husband was an apostate as well, and that you left Kirkwall for him."

"Yes, Malcolm was an apostate who escaped the Kirkwall circle so we could have a life for our newborn son, Jon." She looked at a small painting on the wall, showing their whole family, Bethany in pigtails and stocky boy. There was a taller boy who must have been Jon. They looked happy all things considered, I'd seen apostates dragged before the circle, their lives were hard, cases like Morrigan and Flemeth far and in between. "It was hard, we were forced to move around often to avoid the Templars, but we were content." Leandra continued on. "Once Malcolm…passed, things Jon left us, they were very close, things haven't been the same."

Leliana nodded, "The passing of a loved one is hard for everyone involved, if you don't mind me asking, it seems as though you mean to move quite soon, yes?"

Leandra nodded her head looking around at the house, "Yes, Malcolm and I built this home ourselves, raised our children here, but since Carver came back from Ostagar with news of the horde, we have no choice, any time we can gain on them is needed, Jon should be in town in town buying supplies for the journey, I sent Carver after him, they should be back soon, I'm sure they'd love to meet you." Bethany laughed under her breath and muttered something about Carver but Leandra shut her up with a sharp glare.

"I believe we've already met them." Nessa said bristling, Leliana looked guilty as well, Leandra groaned and put a hand to her face.

"What trouble did my boy get himself up to, sister Leliana please tell me?" Bethany also seemed worried.

"Mother I told you I should have gone with Carver; whatever he did I could have stopped him before it went too far."

"I don't know about that." I said sheepishly, "I wasn't there but it seems like your sons, or at least Jon, ran afoul of some of the Teyrn's men in the Dane's Refuge, it wasn't pretty." Leandra went white.

At that moment the front door opened and a whistling tune filled the room as two men walked in laden with sacks, "Mother we're home." One said in a deep voice, one of the men was obviously Carver, his resemblance to Bethany clear, the other was…wow, Gareth had told me how much I resembled the man but still, grow my hair out, gain a little height, get a beard, he was me. He looked at me with a shocked expression.

**-Nessa Mahariel-**

By the Creators that tune, I felt myself tensing uncontrollably, hand twitching towards my knife, as the shem walked into the room accompanied by his brother. He gave off the same air he had when I'd met him at the tavern, the same I'd seen around Duncan and Gareth back in the keeper's tent, deadly.

"Mother you should have let us know you'd have guests, especially…" He looked to me and Leliana grinning just like Will would. "Sister, Warden, I apologize if I scared you earlier today, I wasn't in the best of moods at the time."

"So it's true what they said." Leandra said in a hard voice as she stood out of her chair, Jon's back stiffened and he rubbed the back of his head guiltily. "Carver, you were supposed to look after your brother!"

Carver looked down at the floor nervously, "He's old enough to look after himself, I'm not his keeper Mother."

"It's not Carver fault mother" Jon interjected trying to draw her attention away, "It was my fault, one of Carver's friends saw me and told me about some trouble and asked if I'd help, Carver hadn't found me yet, there was nothing he could have done."

The elderly women threw her hands up in exasperation, "By the Maker Jon they were the Teyrn's men, the Teyrn's, why did you need to get involved?"

"They were making trouble, some poor sod almost got killed because they didn't like his face, plus they attacked me first, thought I was some warden who," he gestured at me, "I'm guessing is this man here, and wished to arrest me for treason, I was defending myself."

Leliana looked at the man harshly, "I tried to stop you all, tried to end it without violence, what you did afterwards however can hardly count as defending yourself, some of those men will never be the same after what you did!"

"Then they'll never hurt anyone again sister, they weren't exactly endearing themselves to anyone, I did the town a favor, plus I owed Barlin."

Leandra grabbed his face and turned him towards her with a serious look on her face, "Did you use it, did you, and will they come after us, you, your sister? Jon tell me you didn't!"

The man smiled reassuringly and shook his head, "No mother, I didn't, we're safe, really did you expect me to endanger you all like that, now?"

(1 Hours Later)

We were all seated around the table in her small dining room, Leandra and Leliana setting the table. Meanwhile Jon and Will were talking and laughing animatedly.

"So you've been to Orzammar, Jon?" Will asked, his eyes lighting up like a small child's, Jon seemed to take it in stride.

"Well since father passed, I just needed to get out, to grow you know, so I thought see the world." He laughed, "Orzammar is a treat, you'd have to see it to believe it."

"Where'd you pick up those skills then?" I asked suddenly, his eyes caught mine and I saw them flash towards his mother who was still chatting amicably with Leliana in the kitchen. I continued, "You brought down 8 men with a knife, you don't learn that simply by traveling around. So how?"

"Well, I needed coin to get to all these wondrous places, and I needed skills other than well, there are subtler ways of defending yourself on the road, such as a blade, that don't draw so much negative attention, I worked as a hired thug more than once in my travels and over time picked up what I could from those I worked with."

"Bandits you mean." I said harshly, he waved his arm at me gesturing for me to keep it down.

"No never bandits, I'll admit some of those I worked with were less than lawful, smuggling, intimidation, thievery that sort of thing, once I'd heard that the horde was down south however near Lothering, I worked my way back here, just to check on things and get my family out of harm's way, met Carver on the way here, and now we're just trying to get out with our hides intact." He looked towards the kitchen and sighed, "It's hard for her you know, she and my father built this place with their own two hands, and now she has to leave it all behind again. I'm not the best son, I ran away, left her to deal with things, but now I'm back. Elf you know how, I've met some Dalish, clan and family is everything to your people, you do what you can."

I shrugged and went back to my thoughts.

Will nodded his head, "So Jon, how do you feel about joining up with our group, at least when we leave tomorrow, it'll be safer as a group, we can escort you."

"I don't see why not, we're already offering you a bed for the night, when the morning comes, you find your fellows and we can leave, safety in numbers right."

Gareth was going to love this, well it wasn't much of an issue, so we would leave with some extra people.

I made to walk outside when I stiffened, no, no it was too soon.

Will noticed and made to put an arm on my shoulder, "Nessa, what's wrong?"

I turned my head to look at him shaking, "Their coming Will, so many, and their coming right now." The song was playing in my head, the whispers of the darkspawn now screams. The horde had come to Lothering.

-End

A/N: Cliffhangers, gotta love them, anyway sorry about the delays, I had my birthday and anniversary last week and things are really speeding up in school, midterms and what not. Anyway next chapter we have some glorious action and we finally get out of Lothering. Thank you all so much for the follows, the favorites, and the reads.


	12. Chapter 12

FIRES BURNING

**-Gareth Cousland-**

"Alistair! Bryant! We need to move the men to the square and gain the hordes attention; the town people are being slaughtered!" The two men nodded before running back into the madness. I looked down at my sword coated in dark blood, how did this happen? The Horde was supposed to be a few days away at least by current standards; we should have had more time. Had a group broken off, I didn't know which alternative was worse, that the horde was this fast or that the huge number of darkspawn here now was only an advance group. It was the screams and explosions from the southern border of the town that had alerted us in the chantry, followed by the sickly sweet song of the horde beating its way into my skull.

The next hour had been a flash of frantic movements, shouting, and fighting through flaming buildings and side streets against more darkspawn then I'd ever seen. So far we'd managed to pull together a mix of around twenty guards and Templars along with a large group of refugees and priests in the town square. The number varied, with each engagement we lost men but gained help wherever we found it, though most of them were more concerned with finding their families and escaping with their skins. Looking around, I noticed most of our soldiers were boys barely old enough to swing a sword and elders who should have put one down long ago.

"Knight Commander! My Lord Warden!" a voice rang out from one of the alleyways as a haggard looking messenger ran up to our small group. "Lord Warden", where did they get the idea for that name? "A large group of darkspawn is moving west towards the countryside; at current pace they look to beat us there!" the young man managed to stammer out. I growled we had been working our group west towards the town outskirts; it was the refugee's best chance of escaping using the highways.

"I'm starting to wish you hadn't sent Morrigan off to warn the others, a little magic would go a long way right now." Alistair stated as he turned away from Bryant and walked to stand beside me. The Templars hadn't been overly pleased when they'd discovered Morrigan was a mage, even with the fake warden status she seemed to have, they were still shooting Alistair and I dirty looks. On the opposite end the guards and townsfolk we had with us seemed to idolize us; deferring to us as much as Bryant, not that the senior Templar was complaining, he had enough on his plate. "Do you think their alright Gareth? Will and the others I mean." He said with a pained look on his face.

I sighed and lowered my head "Alistair, Nessa seems to have a much greater grasp on sensing the taint then either of us, she'll know if any are coming long before they can surprise them, plus I doubt even the mage is blind enough to miss the whole town burning, they'll be alright even if the witch can't find them." I hit the former Templar on the back, the clang of metal on metal causing him to jump up, "Focus, we need to focus on what we can deal with now, which means getting these people out of here. I need you focused." He nodded then looked around at the burning buildings and the distant howls of the horde.

"It's going to get worse isn't it Gareth." He said in a flat voice. "Duncan had me read all of the old histories of the blights, all the loss, the destruction, but to see it in person. What can we do?"

"We do our duty Alistair, it's all we have left."

I turned away and noticed a balding old man trying to comfort a small crying girl, probably his granddaughter. The man was shaky in aged armor obviously too heavy for him carrying a helmet at his side. I walked up to him; the girl stopped crying and ran to hide behind his legs looking up at me. The elder tried to stand up straight and salute but was having trouble.

"My lord warden, is there something I can do for you?" The man asked looking worried, he clutched the girl closer to him. "If it's the girl, I'm sorry if she's being loud I can quiet her, I just need a minute."

I held up a hand and shook my head, "No, no trouble, is she your granddaughter?"

The man turned to the girl with a sad look in his eye and nodded. "Yes my lord, she's my son's child, they were on the outskirts when those creatures came. She managed to get away and run to my house, my son and his wife they… didn't make it. I didn't know what else to do so I took her with me."

"Forgive me, I'm sorry." I looked the man over. "That's good quality armor, were you a soldier?"

The man gazed at himself proudly, "Yes sir, fought in the rebellion years ago as an officer, bloodied my fair share of Orlesians in this armor, kept it all these years out of sentiment I suppose, there are a lot of veterans here in Lothering. When Anna came running in to my house covered in blood, I thought it would be a good way of helping her be brave, seeing her grandpa in armor just like in his old war stories." He shrugged. "To be honest my lord, I doubt I'll be much use in a fight now, can hardly move in this plate, old bones and such, and I can't say my sword plays like to have improved much, but I'd rather go down dressed as a soldier and fighting if it means I can get her out of here safely."

I nodded, "I need you to do something for me." The man stood attentively, "I need you to get these other veterans and whatever townspeople can wield a weapon, we're moving for the outskirts with me and the Templars leading the charge but, we need a group to protect and lead the noncombatants if we fail."

"Yes my lord, I'm certain we can do that much at least" The man nodded eagerly and began walking towards the mass of townspeople, his granddaughter in tow.

I grimaced and began looking for Bryant. This was what I was fighting for; to keep the people like them safe so old men wouldn't need to risk themselves and children wouldn't be orphaned by monsters. We had lost Lothering, all we could do was save as many as we could, but I would not see the rest of Fereldan suffer a similar fate. I might hate it, but this was my duty now, if only it didn't weigh so damn much.

I found Bryant praying with his Templars and the Revered mother in a secluded part of the yard, they were cold and pompous, and more than a little angry at being forced to abandon the chantry, however the knights were the best soldiers available to me. "Bryant we're moving to the outskirts but there will be darkspawn blocking our path, we need to move quickly and break through before their numbers increase anymore."

The Revered mother stepped in between me and the knight, hands on her hips "Excuse me warden, but I must protest, the Templars must go back to the chantry, we left a great amount of holy relics and tomes in our hasty flight which we must recover." I was dumbstruck.

"Well Revered mother, I must protest that that plan is suicidal, foolish, and will waste the lives of all of these men and likely kill all of these people." I stated plainly to her face. The small woman was quickly growing redder and redder.

"Young man, some of the tomes left behind were written before your grandfather was born and are irreplaceable treasures, and that's not even counting some of the other items of note, any true believer would risk everything to see them unharmed." She rambled on; meanwhile I was just trying to breathe calmly, in and out, in and out, all the while my fists were shaking. The Templars noted this and I could see some reaching for their weapons. I still had no clue why my temper seemed so out of control in recent weeks. At first it only seemed to happen when I fought particularly hard, or was stressed to the limit, but now it seemed to be rising when I least expected it at the simplest reasons.

"We have people who have lost everything and are just trying to get out of this with their lives and your concerned about dusty scrolls and your tithes" I still remembered how I'd been forced to grovel and bribe the despicable women for Sten's freedom, bitch. I could almost hear the metal in my gauntlets creaking. "If you take your men, we will have that much harder of a time breaking through the horde, people will die women!"

"The maker will protect them as he wills, as will you, that is what you wardens are good for correct? Other than king slaying it seems." the women turned to Bryant, "Ser Bryant, organize your men, we must be swift if we are to save what we can."

"Revered mother I can't leave these people behind, I swore to keep them safe." Bryant stated defiantly, she glared at him.

"Ser Bryant I am the revered mother of this Chantry, the same chantry you swore an oath to obey and serve."

"I swore to uphold the Maker's justice, not to willingly abandon those I can save."

In the end the women left along with most of the Templars willing to follow her. Bryant remained behind with a dozen others who were unwilling to leave the refugees, we'd had a force nearing 80 not ten minutes ago.

"DAMN IT!" I shouted slamming my fist into a burnt out support, leaving spider webbed cracks in the weakened wood. I had to calm down, couldn't lose my head, not here where people could see.

"Excuse me, sir" A small voice floated from behind me, I turned to find the small girl from before staring up at me, she had a bulky sack slung over her shoulder. "Are you okay?"

I composed myself before I answered, "I'll be alright, Anna was it?" The girl nodded and then looked off to where Ser Bryant was organizing the troops, "Why did all the knights go away? Weren't they gonna help us?" She asked turning to me.

"They aren't going to help us child, they believe they have more important things to worry about." It was harsh but lying to the girl wouldn't help matters. She just gazed down at her feet,

"Is it true that you're a warden, like thems from the stories, they ride griffons and fight the monsters and slay dragons, your one of them right?" She said shyly.

"Yes I am, though I don't have my griffon with me at the moment, and I've never seen a dragon." I joked, it had been a while since I had felt like joking with anyone.

"Are you going to save me and Grandpa from the monsters?" She began to tear up, damn it I was no good with kids, Oren was bad enough.

"I'm certainly going to try." I said trying to be more confident then I was feeling.

"It's just the monsters got Mama and Papa, I don't want them to get Grandpa too, I don't wanna be alone." She was crying fully now, poor girl.

I kneeled down and put an arm on her shoulder, she gazed at me, trying to hold in her sobs. "I know it's hard Anna, believe me it's hard, losing everything, everyone." My scar ached as I recalled that night, "But you need to be strong right now, for you and your grandpa, okay." The girl wiped her eyes and nodded, I smiled "Okay now get back to the town people; I'm sure your grandfathers worried.

She shook her head then reached inside the sack she was carrying, pulling out a helmet; I recognized it as the one her grandfather had been carrying before. "He is the one that told me to find you." She said plainly, holding out the helmet, I took the helmet in my hands, it was of plain but solid make, steel with a full faceplate, and the most distinguishing feature was a long jagged mark down the left side of the helm.

"What happened here?" I asked pointing to the scratch.

"When grandpa was fighting in a big battle a long time ago, someone swung their sword at him but it glanced off the side, since then grandpa said it was like a good luck charm, every time he wore it he felt strong, and he never got hurt, like magic." She said, eyes beaming.

"Shouldn't he keep it then?" I asked, she just shook her head again.

"Grandpa says it hurts his neck to wear it now and that it wouldn't be bad if a hero wears it now, he said that you'd need all the luck you can get fighting the monsters." I grinned at that and stood up, it had been a while since I'd fought with a helmet, and Maker knows that I need one.

"Get back to your grandfather Anna, and tell him the grey warden says thank you, I will fight off every monster I see until your both safe." I was glad to see the girl smile at that. As she ran off I looked at the helmet, beaten, scarred, but still holding together after all that, it would do the job, just like I had too.

**-Nessa Mahariel-**

"We have to go back now, as fast as we can!" I found myself shouting at the swamp witch. The women had seemingly come out of nowhere, just walked out of the trees and told us that we needed to move away from the town.

"Tis not my decision, the scarred lord and the idiot are the ones making the decision, I am merely a messenger." The women said raising her arms, shrugging.

"We can't just leave them there tho…" Will put a hand on my shoulder and shook his head.

"Nessa we need to leave, Gareth is just trying to make sure a grey warden lives past tonight, plus." He grinned at me through the dark, "he's Gareth, take it from me the guy practically got his head lopped off before I met him and that just made him angry, and Alistair's no pushover, they can make it out."

I gritted my teeth and lowered my head, worrying wouldn't do anything, and it made sense in the end, we couldn't have every warden die here.

"So where are we to go now?" The witch continued, "I expect that the two of them would have a much better chance of finding us again near the highway."

"I spoke with Gareth about it, and we decided it might be a good idea to go to the head east to the Brecilian forest." I spoke up causing both mages to turn towards me. "My clan had been planning to meet with another group of Dalish there to trade lore and artifacts but then there was the incident with the…" I paused for a moment remembering that damn mirror, "anyway my clan declined the invitation but the clan should still be there for another few weeks, game is plentiful and it is a popular area to use when wintering." Will nodded curtly.

"Alright so we have a plan, head east down the highway and regroup with Gareth and Alistair when we can, then head to recruit the Dalish with Nessa's help, the only issue would be finding how do we track Gareth and Alistair down before we leave."

"That is no trouble, I made sure to mark each of you wardens when you first arrived on my mother's doorstep, I will be able to track you to an extent." The witch said simply, we both stared at her.

"Wait you marked us, what, how?" Will started looking down, inspecting his clothes frantically.

The witch gave a laugh and looked to each of us in turn, "Tis a simple detection spell to tell me where you are, mother taught it to me before we left, just in case we ever got separated, she thought it clever and useful."

"Still you could have told us." I growled, the women just shook her head with renewed giggles, Will just looked embarrassed. This woman would want to be able to keep tabs on us, my people had many similar stories of her mother which we used to scare young children and keep them out of trouble.

"Well in any case, it's decided." Will said shifting uncomfortably.

"Cousin, we're ready to leave when you are!" Carver's voice rang out across the field, the Hawkes had finished packing in a flurry of shouts and curses, though I couldn't help noticing how familiar they were with the process, each one of them had a duty that they were to accomplish. Running from the human Chantry seemed to teach hard lessons about moving quickly.

We began to move towards the house when my head suddenly rang with the hordes music, how, I could just barely feel the darkspawn on the border of my senses but now I could clearly feel a small group coming towards us, how could they have gotten so close. Will was having a similar reaction, searching the surrounding trees frantically as I drew my bow.

Suddenly a stream of creatures sprang from the undergrowth running like dogs, letting out a deafening screech, they were heading straight for us.

"What are those things?" I heard Will shout as he fumbled for his staff, Morrigan was already chanting.

I took aim and fired, my arrow striking one of the creatures in the throat as it tried to howl again causing it to tumble and roll knocking down two others. "Whatever they are, they can still be killed, focus!" I shouted already placing another in my sights. One arrow to each creature, they were fast but they seemed to lack the thick hide I'd seen on other darkspawn types.

A burst of fire detonated close by, Will had finally gotten in the fight and I could hear Carver shouting as he hacked away at them. The creatures seemed to be learning however and were spreading out so magic would be less effective. These things we're throwing off my senses, I could feel them like darkspawn but I couldn't place where they were, it didn't help that they almost blended with the shadow, making them almost impossible to spot.

"Elf behind you!" Carver shouted from across the field, I turned and saw one of the creatures leap at me fangs bared claws reaching, no time to raise my bow or go for my knife I leapt back but it wouldn't be enough. Suddenly the air in front of me seemed to thicken and the creature was crushed to the floor in an explosion of gore, almost as if a boulder had crushed it, I turned and saw the older Hawk brother grinning at me, hair wild and knife bloody, he winked and then waved his arm at another creature, this one flew back several feet into a nearby tree with a sickening crunch. The creatures were relentless but were soon dealt with. Carver collapsed to the ground heaving, clutching his sword; Jon just stood looking off in the distance.

"By the Maker, I hoped after Ostagar I might be able to get away from these things." Carver panted out between breaths. He turned to look at the darkspawn that had leapt at me and scowled, turning on his brother. Jon just shrugged and smiled at me, it's been a while since I got to cut loose like that, a long while, he stretched. Plus I couldn't just let her die could I? Win, win for both of us."

"You're a mage as well then?" Will asked, dusting himself off, he and Morrigan seemed untouched, must not have allowed any close to them.

Jon sighed and rubbed the back of his neck, "Yep, I am. Don't like to depend on it as much as Bethany, but I know a few tricks."

"I saw, tis Force magic correct, simple but brutally effective?" Morrigan asked interested.

"It's all I'm really good at, I can't heal or cast wards or anything like that, just break things." He turned and looked at each of us, " Now if you don't mind we need to be going, we'll go with you as far as the highway but we're heading to Gwaren, we want out of this country and I don't like our chances with the darkspawn."

"You're certain, you've proven yourself a capable fighter, you'd be a great help?" I asked uncertainly, I was uncomfortable with the man but the true could be said of many of the people I'd met since leaving my clan and I've been proven wrong before.

"Forgive me warden, cousin" He shook his head at both me and Will and grinned sadly, "I need to get mother and the twins out of danger, I abandoned them once, I'm not going to do it again, even for you, you understand that." Will nodded.

Carver spat on the ground and I thought I picked up a few choice words aimed at his older brother, but Jon helped him to his feet all the same. "We can make the highway by morning if we hurry, come on, there might be more of those things."

**-Alistair-**

"Move forward, provide a distraction for the townspeople, Templars cover the rearguard!" Gareth shouted over the clamor of blades and shouting. "Alistair with me!" We'd managed to avoid most of the darkspawn and had taken the initial creatures posted by the road out into the country by surprise, the Templars cutting through the darkspawn ranks easily, however now it was simply a matter of holding off the many groups that came in response while the refugees moved. We'd overturned some carts to form simple barricades to help as much as we could.

"Right!" I yelled moving forward, running through a particularly large hurlock through the chest, twisting my sword as I freed it I slammed the creatures face with my shield for good measure. One advantage we had over darkspawn was that they depended on the sheer fear they instilled in their prey, they might be big but aside from a few exceptions, most possessed no training and just hammered away at their opponent until their strength gave out, their numbers made up the difference however. No matter how many I stabbed, decapitated, or broke under my shield, there was more, always more. I made my way to the large warrior who was at the moment engaged with an armored hurlock and a small genlock. I don't know where he got that helmet but somehow it made him seem bigger and much more intimidating. With a swipe of his sword the hurlock lost its arm then with a quick pivot slammed the edge of his shield into the hurlocks face, crushing its skull. He finished of the flailing creature with a quick flick, slicing out the beast's throat.

Gareth stood straight and stretching his shoulders covered in fresh gore, and turning to find his next opponent to the cheers of all who saw him like a storybook hero from a mummer's tale. According to Duncan's report, the man had been scion to one of the greatest noble houses in Fereldan, only a stone's throw in terms of power with the king himself; however Gareth didn't carry himself like some of the posh nobles I'd met before in the chantry growing up.

He was certainly more rugged and down to earth then most who grew up wealthy, not afraid to get his hands dirty, and also lacked the elitist disdain for those they viewed as lower than them. He also didn't fight like most nobles; he was brutally effective, pure aggression, where many used finesse and flourishes. The most amazing thing about him however was his ability to command and inspire those who followed him, definitely a noble trait in rare supply these days, he just needed to see it for himself, and get rid of his temper.

"Definitely makes my job easier, I probably would've gotten us killed by now." I muttered under my breath and smiled. I ran beside him and was shocked, we'd spent most of the night fighting hard and moving quickly through burnt out wreckage, I myself was heaving, the former noble however was barely winded.

"How many have made it through?" he asked, voice muffled by the helmet, maker and he looked scary enough already.

I paused wiping some blood off my face and surveyed the situation, "Most of the refugees are in the fields being escorted by the guards, they shouldn't meet too much resistance if we keep holding here, our blood calls to them, most darkspawn can't resist it."

Gareth nodded "Good, we just have to hold a little longer, where's Bryant?"

"Here my lord!" The man yelled from across the field, as we approached I saw the man leaning against a well while a squire was attempting to seal the stump where his hand used to be. "One of the spawn got me while my back was turned, barely held him off." The man grimaced.

"Bryant, I can sense a large group of Darkspawn approaching, we hold these off and the refugees should be able to out enough distance on the highway, the horde likes to build strength before moving, it's rare for them to put much effort into chasing down prey, especially after something like this." I pointed to the husk Lothering had become in but one night.

"We have eight Templars and around twenty guardsmen still able to fight, we can hold them my lord" another Templar said walking up to us.

25 minutes later

"Die you monster!" I swung my sword splitting a genlock from shoulder to sternum, as it fell away a hurlock leapt up dragging the man next to me screaming into the mess. "Maker damn you!" I put my sword through the flighty spawn's face.

"Hold steady! Archers fire at will!" Gareth shouted, I'd lost track of him after the initial charge and the darkspawn overwhelmed us, he'd been with the Templars at the front barricade, unfortunately such a large force of darkspawn aren't so easily cowed, looking up I could see where he now stood, a bare patch amongst a sea of darkspawn, roaring as he brought death to the creatures left and right giving them pause, even the Templar survivors nearby were steering clear of him as he mowed them down. However I saw he would not be able to hold out, then out of nowhere a howl split the night and two large shapes barreled past me leaping over the walls and crashing through the darkspawn, one leaping to catch a darkspawn's arm in it's fangs as it took a swing at Gareth's back while the other dragged another down close by.

"Drey, and Nessa's Falon, where did they come from, they had been at the bridge watching the supplies, a large form rose up behind me I turned around and saw Sten looking down at the dogs, bedecked in his strange armor, dreadlocks flaring out behind him. I also noted that he was hefting a huge sword with a long, thick blade. He looked down at me and shook his head, "I come to fight by your side warden as I said, now," he turned to the darkspawn and raised his sword in front of his face as if praying, "Ataash Qunari!" he roared drawing the attention of the horde before leaping down to join the fray. His blade was a circle of death, each swing hewing through multiple darkspawn, chanting the whole way in his calm tone until he and Gareth stood side by side, Gareth just nodded and fell in beside him sword raised and shield brought to bear.

"Maker, there's a country full of those things?" I muttered before shaking my head, I looked at the men who were still standing with me, ah fuck it, I raised my sword drawing their attention "Well come on, are we going to let ourselves be outdone, let's make these creatures pay! For Lothering!" I leapt down into the battle.

-End

A/N: Hey everyone, thanks for reading, it's finally time for the main story, I think these chapters are going to be biweekly for the time being, any students out there know midterms are a bitch. Thanks for all your support and for sticking with me this long.

Gareth's New helmet, (add scratch)

wiki/Warden%27s_Coif


	13. Chapter 13

**CRACKS**

**-William Amell-**

"William they are coming, it will be as I've said, both are coming down this road at this very moment, cease your worrying or I will make you cease."

I closed my eyes and just kept pacing despite the threat, Morrigan had a point, but here whole "marking" trick still sounded a fishy, plus if it was real it meant I had to have a serious talk with her about privacy. It'd been an hour past dawn when we'd reached this spot on the highway and the Hawke's said goodbye, it was bittersweet, finally meeting members of my family who accepted me for what I was, at least most of them seemed too, and then being forced to part so soon. They'd even asked if I wanted to join them. A part of me truly did wish to go with them, leave this whole crazy fight and go to my back to my homeland, check on things, hopefully piss on father's grave, yeah still a little vengeful heh, and just leave things to those who could really handle it. I mean I had magic but I knew myself, I'm not much of a fighter compared to Gareth or Alistair, even Nessa held up better than me and she was apparently as new to this as I was.

Hell, I was still getting used to seeing blood, I'd had to ask Nessa what that herb that she used was so I could find it myself. As for our newer companions, Morrigan was a mage in a completely different spectrum of power to me and she showed it too, she could do things with magic I hadn't even known possible. Leliana was a mystery, she seemed the perfect sister but the skirmish we'd had earlier with the darkspawn proved otherwise, she'd grabbed a bow the Hawke's had kept lying around and appeared almost as accurate as Nessa, she also had this long thin knife she kept somewhere, I'd only seen flashes of it but it slit through darkspawn easily enough.

Compared to them I wasn't shaping up too be much, but when Jon gave the offer I couldn't say yes, it would mean abandoning an entire country to probable destruction and Duncan's face just kept haunting me.

"I really am stuck in this shit aren't I?" I whispered to myself, putting my head in my hands and shaking it. I couldn't tell if anyone had heard me, Nessa looked at me with a confused glance but that may have been at how I was acting. I tried shooting a grin her was but she just shook her head and went back to whatever she'd been doing for the last few hours, something with a few herbs and fair amount of swearing or maybe praying, never was very good with Elvish, Rayya and Wynne tried to get me to learn but I always seemed to have better things to do. Leliana was writing in a small book, I'd tried to ask her what it was earlier while I was trying to put off stress, but she just shut the thing with a clap and chewed me out for trying to pry into a ladies personal business. I saw her shudder from the cold more than once, even Nessa was showing signs, we'd been expecting to move fast and hadn't set up more than a small fire and little else, Morrigan didn't seem fazed and I had whatever enchantment my coat gave off, I felt like I was in a warm sitting room instead of a dank highway in the middle of the night.

"Morrigan, how close are they to getting here, we've been here for a long time and we should find cover soon or go meet them." I asked walking up to her; the woman looked at the two others before giving me a hard glare, golden eyes flashing, man that was scary, attractive, but scary.

"Tis not I that determines how quickly they will arrive William, all I can say is they are alive and they will be here soon, the spell itself is not very specific." She answered looking away; I could tell she was one of those people that hated not knowing something.

"It's okay, it's alright" I tried to reassure her, "We just have to think smart now, we're still not sure if those things from before can come back, Nessa's scared cause we can barely sense them, not to mention we're all tired" again with the glare, "Ok, most of us are tired, we need to…"

"William"

"lay camp down and try again in the morning, if you say their alive then I know their alive, but Alistair said that if we were separated we needed to focus on…"

"Will!" she interrupted briskly pointing to the side down the road behind me and turned me around physically when I didn't respond fast enough.

I had to squint in the near darkness but I could just make a few shadowy forms as as a large cart pulled by a huge stocky creature, two on all fours and one of the walking ones stood much taller than the others, way too tall to be human, thinking of darkspawn I reached for my staff and made to shout to the others when I felt a light hand on my shoulder I looked over and saw Morrigan shaking her head, looking back I could finally begin to make out details on the approaching party, the two four legged creatures barked and came bounding towards me and Nessa, who looked up in shock when her Falon knocked her over, Drey attempted to do the same but I had gotten Gareth to teach me his stop command after around the fifth time it happened, so I emerged relatively unscathed. The giant must be Sten the Qunari Gareth had helped out in town earlier, who was striding calmly without a sound, Gareth had told me he was big but Maker I could see why Alistair had had his doubts. The two at his side were walking albeit with a lot more limps and audible curses. What struck me however was that each of them was absolutely drenched in blood from head to toe.

"I told you." I heard the witch whisper in my ear; I could just tell she was grinning.

**-Nessa Mahariel-**

"Hey Nessa, we should be entering the Brecilian Forest proper any day now right?" Alistair's voice rang out through the dawn air shaking me from my meditations, the last few days had been trying for everyone in our party since escaping Lothering, I'd found that meditating while in the move made the time pass much more quickly, and also served to keep the baying, jerky movements of the horse underneath me at bay.

"We've already entered Shem! Yesterday!" I shouted back at the man who was at the moment lounging on his ass in the cart those two dwarves brought with them, saddled up with extra rest next to one or both of the hounds because of his injuries, no, no that's not fair, I palmed my forehead, the Templar had been hurt badly during the escape from Lothering. According to him the Wardens and their soldiers had had to charge into a sea of darkspawn cutting down all in their path, they had left just enough alive to inspire fear of the Grey Wardens in the hearts of the spawn, (His words) and escaped. According to Sten, the Qunari giant, in one of the few conversations I'd had with him that counted as more than a few audible grunts and glares, said that after slaying an admirable number of darkspawn, Gareth led the surviving troops in a successful escape, fleeing the town and halting the hordes advance to sufficiently protect the towns survivors.

The Templars and guardsmen had left to rejoin the other refugees heading to nearby northern settlements, while the three companions had tried working their way to the highway following the dogs. Along the way they managed to rescue a pair of dwarves, Bodahn and his curious son Sandal, from some darkspawn stragglers. The old dwarf pledged them the use of their cart and was willing to trade with us and provide supplies for whatever we needed. The idea of making us pay after saving their lives sounded foolish to me but Gareth had waved it off. Having a cart to travel in and carry supplies was worth it apparently, and by the end of the first night after some negotiation between himself and the dwarf, all in the party except Morrigan and Sten had new supplies including a tent and bedroll. Morrigan having her own supplies and Sten eschewing their use.

Will had spent his time with our injured, namely Gareth and Alistair. He'd been taking turns with each of them since, healing what he could while trying to save his strength, Sten outright refused healing muttering something about not wishing his honor tarnished accepting healing from a Bas Sarebas, which I took to mean mage, Gareth was almost completely healed sporting only a few new scars but it seemed Alistair was having difficulties with the process regarding his past as a Templar, magic was more difficult to use on him personally. "It's because I began using the abilities again in force since leaving Ostagar, the resistance builds up over time." he'd said apologetically as Will struggled with healing him.

So as it was, he rode in the carriage with whatever it is the dwarves sold, while the rest of us walked, taking shifts on one of the few horses we had. Looking around at my companions I could see the pressure building as we neared our first destination, even I felt some trepidation at meeting my own people after so long among outsiders. I'd told Gareth and Alistair that a large group of Dalish, one of the larger groups in Fereldan at present, regularly used this forest as a wintering spot and that my clan was familiar to them, however I had no idea just how accommodating they'd be to a ragged group like ours even if one of their own vouched for them. Well hopefully this clan would be of a mind to talk first before drawing their bows. Finding them wouldn't be too difficult; I could already see examples of the trail signs, clans used for navigation in the wildlife adorning trees and stones. With their limited vision, Shems would have little chance of following them but for one who grew up among the Dalish and had the sight, following such signs was second nature. Seeing such familiar symbols of my people again were a comfort if nothing else, it had been much too long since I'd had any such reminder of them. I cringed a little inside as memories of day with Merrill and Tamlen came floating to the forefront of my mind along with the looks and glares I got from clan members after Tamlen's funeral. I tried some breathing exercises to calm myself to little effect.

"So we've entered the forest have we Nessa?" a tinkling voice came from my side shocking me, I turned to find Leliana staring up at me, Creators, I hadn't even heard the red-head approach.

"Yes we have, the density and variety of the trees marked the shift into the forest, I remembered it when I passed through here a few years ago with my clan while we were on our way north, sister." I replied curtly.

I didn't feel comfortable staying around the women, she seemed nice and got on well with everyone well enough, I still didn't trust her, she wasn't exactly forthcoming about where she obtained her skills which were, if her performance against the darkspawn was any indication, considerable, put that, and the fact that she was just a little too preachy with her beliefs, together and it just made for some awkward conversations, especially when she began talking about her visions. I was not one to judge faith, no matter the religion or gods, and I'd heard of spiritual experiences occurring among the clans from those who'd said the creators spoke to them; this was just the first time I'd been in close proximity to such a person.

"So you've been to the Brecilian forest before Nessa, I've heard stories but I've never met anyone who could say they've actually been anywhere near it." She asked looking astonished.

"Yes, the Dalish often make use of such places to move without incident, canyons, forests, caves, areas where shems don't usually turn up and start trouble. What kind of stories have you heard?" I turned my head to look at the trees, "I've heard of some legends concerning these woods but not much." I was actually quite familiar with the elven histories concerning the Brecilian Forest, Merrill and I loved discussing such things, however I thought it would be nice to let the red haired women speak, I might learn something new and I might as well appear cordial.

The sister considered for a moment and then beamed, "Well I can't say I've heard many stories, most of what I know comes from tavern stories or old histories written from the chantries perspective which I realize can be quite biased on certain subjects." I nodded, it was nice to know that the women was considerate of differing opinions, I'd honestly thought that she would be one of those individuals that took everything at face value. "They're all stories of the battles that occurred between the elves and the Tevinter Imperium's armies. How the bodies of the fallen nurtured the trees and helped them grow and that the souls of the dead now possess the trees allowing them to move and talk."

"The sylvans, yes, I've heard of such creatures from some of the older hunters in my clan, but they always said they were ancient spirits" I couldn't deny my curiousity on the subject, I'd heard little on the battles between the Dales and the Imperium. Not for the first time I cursed my peoples lack of written history, most of the ancient elven language had been lost with Arlathan and our subsequent enslavement to the humans, we'd since recovered some texts since our freedom, but accurate translations were few and far between. Leliana's books which now likely fed darkspawn fires, may indeed have been some of the only accounts on the subject.

"I doubt the souls of the dead would possess trees and such?" Morrigan's voice rang out from behind them, as me and Leliana turned to gaze upon the women walking behind us. Morrigan had little love for horses and the like, preferring to move on her own two feet, occasionally I would lose sight of her and instead catch sight of animals behaving strangely, animals with glowing yellow eyes following alongside our group, I'd almost screamed and drawn my knife when a wolf just walked into camp one night and dropped a few fat rabbits next to the fire. The creature had given me what had approximated a grin and loped off, a few minute later the women had walked out to her own campsite, adjusting her clothes and shooting glances at me. "More likely the violent fighting and the high number of casualties from those battle created a tear in the veil allowing demons and the like to come through from the fade, possessing whatever living things they could, such things are common in the ancient places of the world." The woman continued.

Leliana cocked her head, "But that's not very exciting Morrigan, that might be the reason, it might not, so many things exist in the Maker's world."

The witch groaned looking exasperated, "Oh your Maker again, don't even start, I've told you before…"

I shrugged trying to avoid getting involved, sensing another debate on matters of existence and faith; the two loved them and had been exchanging snide comments with each other for days. As I turned back to the road, I noticed a small symbol carved under a branch indicating we were nearing the outskirts of a hunting ground, I narrowed my eyes. We might be meeting some hunters very soon, if they were responsible, they'd alert their keeper to our curious presence before engaging with us, if they were not, well, I looked to Gareth who at the moment was walking next the cart brooding over what looked like a necklace hanging around his neck, he noticed me watching and shoved it quickly down his shirt again, curious. The large man may be somewhat familiar with Dalish culture, but he was still a shem in the eyes of my people. Plus despite his apparent skill at leading others in battle, Gareth just didn't strike me as the diplomatic type no matter what the Templar claimed. Ever since Lothering the man had been even more anti-social than usual, which was saying a lot.

I was contemplating going over to discuss our plan for meeting with the clan when an arrow struck the ground in front of us, bringing the group to a sudden halt and a loud cry roared from the trees along with another few arrows flying to join the first. Ducking off the horse I ran for the cover of the cart cursing loudly in elven, irresponsible, great...

-End

A/N: Hey guys sorry about the huge delay, writers block and school are really kicking at me right now. I will definitely be putting out more chapters by the end of the month once I get a break. Thanks all for support and reads, you guys are awesome.


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